A six month old baby died on a Wednesday at the Álvaro Cunqueiro de Vigo hospital from complications linked to meningococcal bacterial meningitis.
The child was brought to the emergency department in a critically unstable state on Monday. Despite immediate transfer to the pediatric intensive care unit, the available treatments did not prevent the progression of the illness. The outcome was a rapid fall into fulminant sepsis and organ failure.
All age-appropriate vaccines recommended by public health authorities have been administered. Immunization coverage for this age group is not universal in every community, and gaps can occur for various reasons.
Public health teams did not initiate a mass containment operation. Instead, targeted measures were taken to protect the immediate family, including arrangements for chemoprophylaxis to reduce transmission risk among close contacts.
According to the National Center for Epidemiology, Galicia reported 15 meningococcal disease cases in the first three quarters of the current season, spanning from October 10, 2022, to June 22. Across the state, the highest incidence is observed in children under one year old, with a rate of 4.86 cases per 100,000 people—roughly double the figure from the previous season. Serogroup B remains the predominant strain in circulation.