When a smart young computer programmer flew in to Boston from India, on April 26, brought over for his expertise by a financial services company headquartered in the 18th floor of the John Hancock Tower, little did Boston realize that a potential measles outbreak loomed before them.

On May 5 the characteristic symptoms of measles such as rash, fever, cough began to appear. Following this measles struck another half-dozen workers at Investors Bank & Trust, five on the same floor and four other additional cases as well whose link to the programmer has not yet been confirmed

Boston state authorities has distributed or ordered 23,000 doses of measles vaccine worth nearly $400,000. Several hundred people at three workplaces have been ordered to stay back home until they prove that they aren't susceptible or until the incubation period has passed. Medical records have been scoured, air-flow patterns examined in offices and dozens of interviews conducted to understand and stop the outbreak.

Disease specialists have called attention to the fact that with the globalization of goods and services incubating diseases has also undertaken a global trot.

According to Dr. Gerald T. Keusch, a global health specialist at the Boston University School of Public Health, 'We can no longer think about putting up quarantines at the borders and expect that it's going to work for infectious disease any better than it works for the resourceful, determined people who come across as economic migrants. We can't put up a shield.'