Most of the sanatorium’s several hundred surviving patients fled and are now living in the densely packed tent cities where experts say they are probably spreading the disease. Most of these patients have also stopped taking their daily regimen of pills, thereby heightening the chance that there will be an outbreak of a strain resistant to treatment, experts say.
There is a tuberculosis clinic in Port-au-Prince, but of the 20 doctors and 50 nurses who worked there, only one nurse is showing up for work. The others have either died, are injured, are dealing with family problems, fear the collapse of the building, or they fear the heavy work burden and the chance of infection. The full story is here.
Yes, this is not good.
TB is on the rise in the US, too. And if your children got to a school where there may be children of undocumented immigrants who have not been tested for and may be carrying TB, your children may be exposed. Mine was. Nice middle class public school.
As I understand it, once a person tests positive for TB, they will test positive the rest of their life. Standard treatment is a 6 to 9 month regimen of an anitibiotic and a vitamin. And you are warned to not miss a sngle day.
http://familydoctor.org/online/famdocen/home/common/infections/common/bacterial/120.html
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