Saint Francis Hospital in Hartford has not treated any patients for Legionnaires' disease in 2015, though it did handle three cases late last year. The disease has recently sickened dozens and killed three in New York City.
People do seem to catch the disease during air conditioning season, from inhaling the legionella bacteria, according to infectious disease specialist Dr. Ulysses Wu.
"That's why the majority of these infections are usually pneumonias," Wu said.
New York health authorities suspect the cooling tower at Lincoln Hospital in the Bronx is where the legionella bacteria contaminated water vapor. The cooling system at Concourse Plaza is contaminated too.
Fifty-seven cases of Legionnaires' disease have been reported this month in the Bronx, three of them fatal.
Symptoms are similar to pneumonia: fever, diarrhea, muscle aches and chills. With antibiotics, patients can recover.
Studies of who gets the disease have found it's not just the elderly, not just people with weakened immune systems.
"It is these people who've had a tobacco history or currently smoking who are at bigger risk," said Wu.
Medics have to test patients for Legionnaires' disease to diagnose it. Besides cooling towers, legionella can thrive in the vapor from showers and faucets, hot tubs and mist machines.
Wu also said there's a correlation between Legionnaire's disease and heavier rainfall.
"You don't get it necessarily from other people but just a general rule of thumb in life. What you want to do is you want to use good hand hygiene and if somebody around you is sick then you may not want to go near them," he said.
