At around 2 a.m., 7-year-old twin brothers arrived at Mission Hospital in Asheville. Both had a fever, a cough, a rash, pink eye and cold symptoms.
The boys sat in one waiting room and then another. Two hours and 20 minutes passed before the two were isolated, according to Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services records obtained by KFF Health News. Then two more hours ticked by.
As the sun rose, an emergency room doctor called the state epidemiologist and described the symptoms. The public health official told him to keep the kids in the hospital and quarantine them. Shortly after that call, the patients were diagnosed.
It was measles.
Hospital staff gave the father instructions on how to quarantine the family and sent them home.
The virus exposed at least 26 other people in the hospital that January day, federal investigators determined.
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