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State Health Officials Confirm 3 Chlamydia Cases, Superintendent Responds

Jim Rumage's phone has been ringing off the hook for days after 20 unconfirmed chlamydia cases made its way into national headlines.
By Kim Powell
NewsWest 9 

CRANE - Jim Rumage's phone has been ringing off the hook for days after 20 unconfirmed chlamydia cases made its way into national headlines. Even MTV and the Huffington Post published articles about the alleged outbreak. "I had people from Washington state, from Chicago," Rumage, the superintendent for Crane ISD, said.

As it turns out, the Texas Department of State Health Services says there's only been three confirmed case in Crane County, which has just a little more than 3,000 residents. Rumage says local physicians contacted him to give him a leg up on what was going on, otherwise it could have gone unnoticed as chlamydia typically doesn't show any symptoms.

"Hopefully there won't be anymore, but one case is too many as far as I'm concerned and we were trying to be proactive and do what we felt like was best for kids," Rumage said.

That's why he sent a letter home to parents about the outbreak last week--as a preventative measure. However, the letter states there was a significant number of cases in both Crane and Upton County.

"Evidently they had tested a lot of people but they didn't have any confirmation back and we misunderstood what it was and I was just trying to be proactive," Rumage said.

Crane ISD adopted a new sex education curriculum on Monday, however the main focus will still be on abstinence.

"Anybody that is abstinent is not going to catch this. You can't catch it off a doorknob or whatever like some people are thinking," Rumage said.

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