As health chiefs yesterday met to review the latest position with the legionnaire’s disease scare centering on the village’s Mackay’s Hotel, locals appealed for calm and warned against an “over-reaction”.

With three cases believed to be linked to the hotel and a fourth still being probed as we went to press yesterday, the legionnaire’s scare comes a year after a winter vomiting outbreak hit the Highland Hotel in the Strath.

Contacted for comment, Strathpeffer Community Council chairman Alan Reid acknowledged the seriousness of the disease but stressed the importance of not over-reacting. “The main danger with Legionnaires disease is the gross over reaction by the media towards the disease. Although so far I have not seen much of that.”

He added: “Tourists still seem to be arriving in the area and don’t seem to be put off. The area may suffer a minor blip, perhaps it did last year, but I don’t think it will be a sustained drop in tourism. It has happened at an unfortunate time of year.”

As we went to press yesterday, NHS Highland chiefs were meeting for the fifth time over the issue.

Highland Council’s head of environmental health Alistair Thomson stressed that Mackay’s Hotel is co-operating fully with the investigations. He said, “The company is checking the storage and distribution system for the water supply in the hotel.

“We have found a link between three of the cases but there is no known link to the fourth as yet. Environmental health officers have carried out a surveillance operation looking for any other potential sources of legionnaire’s disease and can reassure local people that nothing has been found.”

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