Diagnosis: Unknown

- Season 1

(2002)

Outside of Roanoke, Virginia, health officials scramble to find the origin of a deadly bacterial outbreak of pneumonia.

Health officials in Albuquerque, New Mexico face an outbreak of a rare and fatal blood disorder. Patients suffer sharp muscular pain, fatigue, fever and rashes. Twenty-one people die from the illness. Five other states report similar cases. The epidemic is spreading. The Center for Disease Control assists federal and state health officials in their hunt for the cause.

A hospital in Walkerton, Ontario is flooded with patients with the same alarming symptoms. All suffer from fever, nausea and gastrointestinal problems. Health officials suspect water contamination, but the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) reports that the water is safe. The next day, 20 more patients are admitted with the same symptoms.

The Discovery Health Channel's program Diagnosis Unknown features an episode entitled "Island Fever" highlighting the details of the Dengue Fever outbreak that occurred in the Hawaiian Islands in the spring of 2001. The Pacific Disaster Center's field data collection capability enabled the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to pin-point Dengue outbreak locations, and work toward eradication of this mosquito-borne virus in the islands.

A Minnesota mother takes her son to the hospital with signs of food poisoning. While he is being treated, she comes down with the same symptoms. Soon, the Minnesota Department of Health is flooded with calls of food poisoning and launches an investigation. They pinpoint the source to a single restaurant and unwashed and unrefrigerated parsley.

In late August of 1999, an infectious disease specialist in Queens, New York reports that she has two elderly patients with neurological disorders. More cases crop up in the following days, several patients die. Initial tests confirm that New York has been hit by an outbreak of the mosquito-borne illness, St. Louis encephalitis. Nearly a month later, exotic birds begin to die at the Bronx Zoo.

In December of 1979, a young girl passes out on a bus in Wisconsin. She is taken to the hospital complaining of a sore throat, fever and aching muscles. Doctors believe she has the flu, until her blood pressure drops and her kidneys begin to fail. When additional women begin exhibiting similar symptoms, which bring them close to death, doctors fear an outbreak of toxic shock syndrome.

During December of 1999, public health authorities in Alberta, Canada are notified of two cases of a rare form of bacterial meningitis. A third reported case claims the life of a seventeen-year-old. Soon after, six more cases are reported and another young life is taken. Health officials think a new strain of the bacteria may be invading the population.

On the tiny resort island of Martha's Vineyard, landscaper, Patrick Ryer, suffers from chills and high fever. Patrick has contracted Tularemia, a rare bacterial disease. Health officials alert residents and tourists who crowd the Vineyard over the summer holiday. Over the next month, ten more people are diagnosed with the disease, including other landscapers and children.

Canadian doctors are alarmed when a middle-aged woman dies of cryptococcal meningitis in 1999. Over the next few years, doctors see dozens of similar infections with pneumonia-like symptoms including shortness of breath, weight loss and severe headaches. Vancouver Island becomes home to the largest outbreak of the deadly fungus anywhere in the world.

For months, members of the McGuire family suffer from chronic illnesses, bronchitis, pneumonia and abdominal pains, fever and chills. When Amy McGuire's respiratory ailments don't respond to any treatment, her parents become alarmed. Amy's mother watches a report on television warning of the dangers of mold in houses.

In 1993, aquatic researcher Joanne Burkholder suffers an array of troubling symptoms while working in her North Carolina State University lab. A fellow researcher confides that he has recently been plagued by bizarre medical problems including memory loss, confusion, numbness and a burning sensation on the skin, symptoms identical to Burkholder's.

When an unpredictable germ terrifies Texas in 1998, the CDC and health officials alert all neighboring states and territories to be on the lookout for streptococcus outbreak, the same bacteria that causes strep throat. This new strain, however, will kill 33 people, causing flesh-eating viruses, introducing deadly toxins into the blood and introducing pneumonia.