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More than 1,000 people in New Jersey and New York have been sickened with mumps since August.
Almost all of those infected with the virus are of the Orthodox or Hasidic Jewish population. The mumps outbreak began at a summer camp for Orthodox Jewish boys in Sullivan County, New York. Health officials have linked the outbreak to an 11-year-old boy at the camp. He had recently returned from the United Kingdom, where a mumps outbreak had spread to 4,000 people.
The boy had been fully vaccinated against the mumps, as had 77 percent of the patients in New Jersey. The vaccine is not 100 percent effective, according to the CDC.
Mumps is a contagious disease caused by a virus. Initial symptoms include fever, headache, muscle aches and loss of appetite, and the disease can cause your jaw and cheeks to swell, with further complications including the inflammation of the brain, testicles or ovaries, and deafness.