NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Tennessee health officials report four more people have been sickened by an outbreak of fungal meningitis.
   
State Health Commissioner John Dreyzehner (DRYZ'-nur) said in a press conference Friday that there are 29 cases in the state and three deaths.
   
The new cases raise the total to 39 people in six states who contracted the rare meningitis after receiving steroid injections for back pain. Five have died.
   
The commissioner repeated three times that "the evidence indicates this is a product issue." He said the clinics administering the shots had no way of knowing the injections were contaminated.
   
The Massachusetts pharmacy that supplied the steroid has recalled nearly 17,000 lots of the medical while federal officials have warned health care providers not to use any products from the New England Compounding Center.

Earlier story:

NEW YORK (AP) - Health providers are scrambling to notify patients in nearly two dozen states that the routine steroid injections they received for back pain in recent months may have been contaminated with a deadly fungal meningitis.
   
It became apparent Thursday that hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of people who got the shots between July and September could be at risk after officials revealed that a tainted steroid suspected to have caused a meningitis outbreak in the South had made its way to clinics in 23 states.
   
The Food and Drug Administration urged physicians not to use any products from the Massachusetts pharmacy that supplied the steroid.
   
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that so far, 35 people in six states have contracted fungal meningitis and five of them have died.

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