MSU’s string of outbreaks came in 1997, 1999 and 2002, which left a combined three students dead.

In December 1996, economics junior Jeffery Pagas died in his Cedar Village apartment after being afflicted with meningococcemia — a sister disease of meningitis that is caused by the same family of bacteria. The State News headline following his death reads, “Student dies from uncommon infection.”

In the article describing Paga’s case, then State News staff writer Amanda Cuda interviewed landscape architecture junior Brian Anderson — a friend of Paga’s. He emphasized that Paga was healthy and that the death of his friend had come as a complete shock.

“He was in great shape, which was the mystery of the thing,” Anderson had said to Cuda.

A few months later, in February 1997, Anderson would be admitted to Sparrow Hospital and be diagnosed with meningococcal meningitis. He would die less than a week later.

Then marketing junior David Ciaravino, Anderson’s friend and roommate, echoed the same comments Anderson had made about Paga.

“He was very healthy,” Ciaravino had told The State News. “I never remembered him once to be sick.”

According to a 1999 State News report, an additional student was hospitalized from meningococcal meningitis later on in 1997, but recovered.

While Paga and Anderson’s cases were deemed unrelated by health officials due to being different strains of disease, the deaths of the two friends seemed to cement meningitis as an anxiety within the East Lansing community.

When the next positive case of meningococcal meningitis was identified in 1999 as then music education sophomore Adam Busuttil, MSU immediately began offering free vaccinations for four of five types of the disease, in addition to the preventative antibiotics they had given close contacts in 1996 and 1997.

About 2,300 students took MSU up on their vaccination offer in a single day while Busuttil fought for his life at Sparrow Hospital. 

Elizabeth Hardy, formerly Elizabeth Vanden Boom, was The State News reporter covering the 1999 case. She said that there was definitely anxiety on campus, but the university was prepared with a near instantaneous response.

“It probably seemed like we were kind of panicked, but of course now it seems nuts compared to COVID,” Hardy said. “Right in that same week, they were handing out vaccines, whoever wanted one.”

Busuttil would eventually recover, losing seven tips of his fingers in the process. In the following years, he would become a prominent activist for meningitis awareness — appearing on TV programs and supporting legislative bills that would help curb the devastating effects of the disease.

MSU’s campus would be meningitis-free for a little over three years before its next positive case.

On Jan. 19, 2002, graduate student Matthew Knueppel would report to Sparrow Hospital after experiencing flu-like symptoms. He was given general flu treatment and left, but returned that night with worsening inflictions.

By the time Knueppel’s condition was identified as probable meningitis, it was too late. He died a few hours later in the early hours of Jan. 20, 2002.

The following day, about 30 students received their meningitis vaccinations at Olin Health Center.

Knueppel would be the last case of meningitis in East Lansing until Jan. 22, 2022, when a University of Michigan student attended a Sigma Beta Rho fraternity function at Club Rush. 

MSU’s 2022 response to the positive case was a reflection of the lessons learned in the past. Close contacts were offered free antibiotic treatments, just as in 1996, 1997, 1999 and 2002.

Vaccines now cover all five types of meningitis and are mandated in Michigan for those entering grade seven