Killer Bug Arrives Ireland's Strep A Alert

Death of 4-yr-old inked to infection’ as air! dies in North

- Sean Murphy

THE death of a four-year-old girl in Ireland is suspected to be linked to an outbreak of Strep A that has already killed a child in the North.

The HSE is probing a surge in the bacterial infection, with 55 confirmed cases.

Dr Eamonn O'Moore said further tests will be done over the death of the Dublin youngster.

HEALTH experts are probing the death of a child in Ireland after Strep A claimed a five-year-old's life in the North.

The HSE was carrying out tests to see if a four-year-old child who died in the greater Dublin area was killed by the bacterial infection.

Health authorities in the North had hours earlier confirmed that a girl in Belfast had died from an illness linked to Strep A.

There have been 55 confirmed cases of invasive Group A Streptococcal (iGAS) in Ireland to date and another 33 in the North, including nine deaths in Great Britain.

There is no vaccine to protect against it. But doctors stressed the outbreak is not an epidemic.

Dr Eamonn O'Moore, who is director for National Health Protection with the HSE and Health Protection Surveillance Centre, revealed the four-year-old child's suspected Strep A death was sent to a laboratory for "further investigation".

He said: "It is reasonable to say it is among the differential diagnoses at this time.