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Valley fever hit epidemic proportions last year and experts are wondering if 2002 will be a repeat.

If the disease infects anywhere near the same number of Kern County residents as it did in the early 1990s, the cost could be staggering. During the epidemic years of 1991-93, valley fever costs mounted to more than $56 million. A similar outbreak now could mean even greater costs.

Researchers are making progress toward a vaccine, but the going has been slow. The Californian examines the impact of the disease and the efforts of those “Fighting the Fever.”

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Robbed of strength Lives of valley fever patients in disarray as they grow too weak for simplest tasks Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM Valley fever doesn't discriminate when picking victims. The fungal spores don't care if they attack a grandmother trying to finish a quilt, a baby still adjusting to the world or someone just trying to make a living. Although most people get valley fever without even knowing it, the disease wreaks serious havoc for an unlucky few. Their recovery can take weeks or, sometimes, years.

Officials fear epidemic will persist for years After cases doubled in 2001, disease again hitting hard this year. Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM Valley fever hit Kern County hard last year, creating an epidemic. Now experts are wondering whether the epidemic will continue this year. In 2001, Kern had 995 reported cases -- more than double the previous year. And there were 11 deaths. So far this year, there's been a 225 percent increase in cases compared with this time last year and five valley fever deaths. This year's cases could be leftovers from 2001 or they could signal the repeat of the multiyear valley fever epidemic that infected thousands in the early 1990s.

Fever spreads when spores ride on wind, lodge in lungs Infection is most dangerous when it assaults the lining of the brain Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM Valley fever. Live in the southern San Joaquin Valley long enough and you'll hear about it. But everyone has a different story to tell. "I didn't know too many people that had it that bad," said Russell Wissink, a Bakersfield construction worker who was out of work for six months due to the disease. "I was kinda ignorant to it." Valley fever can be confusing because it makes a few people really sick, some people a little sick and it doesn't bother most people at all.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Certain groups at greater risk Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM Cleo Cook hasn't been able to do much of anything for 20 years. At age 21, the former construction worker got a bad case of valley fever and life hasn't been the same since. No one can say for sure, but it may be that Cook's race had something to do with that. Cook is African-American. All groups have an equal chance of getting valley fever, but people of certain backgrounds -- including Filipinos and blacks -- are more likely to get severe cases of it. Other factors such as pregnancy and disease also play a role. Cook, 41, developed meningitis, the most serious form of the disease. He has received anti-fungal injections in the back of his neck and takes pills.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Doctor has battled fever for 50 years Plain-spoken expert with famous last name has treated thousands, written key papers in near-obsession with disease Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM Dr. Hans Einstein is a gentle, grandfatherly man with a brilliant mind. And his name is practically synonymous with a terrible, fungal disease. Almost 50 years ago, he performed clinical trials on the first effective -- and still most effective -- drug for the disease. Over the last half-century, he's treated thousands of valley fever patients in Kern County.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Shortcomings in drugs, tests mean frustration for patients Some treatments have only limited effectiveness; others have toxic effects. Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM The fungal spores that cause valley fever have lived in dry, southwestern soils for millions of years, infecting both people and animals who tread in those regions. But it was only about 50 years ago that scientists discovered the first effective treatment for the disease. Decades later, doctors and patients still aren't satisfied with available drugs. Some are toxic, causing horrible side effects, and others are only somewhat effective. Even tests for the disease aren't always reliable. Making matters more difficult, the pharmaceutical industry isn't interested in producing drugs for valley fever, which only affects people in certain regions.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Farm workers first victims of fungus WWII soldiers in Kern for flight training also targets of valley's deadly scourge. Posted: 06/22/02 12:00:00 AM Like countless others before him and countless after, Joas Furtado-Silveira came to California to seek his fortune in the state's expansive farmlands. He left his home in the Azores in the 1880s with a wave of other Portuguese men, in hopes of a better life. At first, things seemed to be working well as Furtado-Silveira found work on farms outside Modesto. But then fungal spores changed his life and his legacy.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Vaccine years away Researchers report progress but public won't see inoculations for at least a decade. Posted: 06/23/02 12:00:00 AM Dr. Demosthenes Pappagianis remembers the excitement surrounding the valley fever vaccine trials of the early 1980s. Scientists thought they had found a way to prevent the fungal disease. "I gave it to my wife," recalls Pappagianis, a longtime valley fever researcher at the University of California at Davis. "She got a sore arm out of it." She wasn't the only one. While it didn't make volunteers seriously ill, they complained so much about the pain and redness researchers reduced the doses until they were no longer effective.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Valley fever dangerous foe to man's best friend Dogs among slew of animals susceptible to debilitating disease. Posted: 06/23/02 12:00:00 AM Cris Reep and her husband love to take their dog, Eddie, to the Panorama Bluffs every morning where he can run around and burn off some energy. But last fall, Eddie's enthusiasm for running began to wane after he inhaled some of the fungal spores that cause valley fever. For three months, Eddie, a whippet, barely moved and refused to eat almost anything. "I really thought he was going to die," Reep said. "It was really, really awful." Many pet owners aren't aware of it, but animals, particularly dogs, are susceptible to valley fever.

Kern at center of valley fever fund-raising effort Cal State Bakersfield and Rotary Club lead drive to find vacine. Posted: 06/23/02 12:00:00 AM Valley fever may have knocked Kern County for a loop with a deadly epidemic in the early 1990s, but residents came back swinging. They did so through pasta dinners, golf tournaments and other grass-roots fund-raising efforts. The goal: A vaccine to land a knockout punch on the fungal spores that cause valley fever. The networking, organizing and political action among Kern folks have made the county the center of funding for the vaccine project. But the fight isn't over yet and continuing research depends on even more dollars, as well as a little luck in the business world.

Dan Ocampo / The Californian Education key to treatment Information about disease useful for visitors, locals. Posted: 06/23/02 12:00:00 AM The San Joaquin Valley may not be California's main tourist attraction, but it gets its fair share of visitors. And a small percentage of those passing through go home with a biological souvenir they never bargained for: valley fever. In the past year alone, two Europeans who came to Lost Hills for a model airplane competition and a handful of out-of-town construction workers, here to build a power plant in McKittrick, were diagnosed with the fungal disease. Without assistance from local medical experts, the patients probably never would have learned what was ailing them.

Treatment costs could skyrocket if last year's epidemic continues Posted: 06/23/02 12:00:00 AM Valley fever cost Kern County more than $56 million during the last epidemic in the early 1990s. While staggering, that figure still probably understates the true costs, said one of the local experts who helped calculate how much money valley fever sucked out of Kern in terms of lost wages, hospital stays and drug costs for the years 1991 to 1993, when the epidemic was raging. The costs were meticulously broken down in a 1996 paper written by doctors Royce Johnson, Hans Einstein, John Caldwell and epidemiologist Gavin Welch, included in the book “Coccidioidomycosis.” In 2001, doctors saw another epidemic caseload of valley fever patients. And experts now are waiting nervously to see if 2002 matches or exceeds that pace. If so, costs could soar far beyond those of the 1990s epidemic.

Courtesy of Cheryl Youngblood Valley fever's personal toll: a widow reflects Posted: 06/23/02 12:00:00 AM My husband, Michael S. Youngblood, was diagnosed with valley fever in November 1997 when he came down with pneumonia. Although he received treatment and returned to work in February 1998, he became ill again in August, received treatment and returned to work in February 1999. Three weeks later, he became violently ill with Coccidioidal meningitis, which is spinal meningitis caused by the valley fever disseminating into the spinal fluid. Although treatment helped keep the meningitis under control for a while, he eventually suffered several small strokes. My children and I watched him deteriorate until he finally passed away in January 2001. He was only 49 years old.