Subscribe to one of our news e-mail lists. College students should be told about the dangers of bacterial meningitis and have easy access to a vaccine for the disease, a government advisory panel said Wednesday. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Advisory Committee on Immunization stopped short of recommending the vaccine be required. Also, the vaccine doesn't always work.
Physicians generally follow CDC guidance in treating their patients.
In 1996, there were more than 600 cases of bacterial meningitis on college campuses in the United States. In June, the CDC reported that the risk of college freshmen living in dormitories of contracting bacterial meningitis was more than six times greater than other students'. The American College Health Association recommends all college students consider getting the meningitis vaccine. The vaccine is 85 percent effective against four strains of bacterial meningitis, which account for about 70 percent of cases in college students. Feels like the flu Meningitis is a potentially deadly inflammation of the fluid in the spinal cord and the fluid surrounding the brain.