IIRC there was a recent thread about immigrants bringing in TB and other diseases we have not seen here in the USA for some time. I guess they don't vacinate their people like we do.
They vaccinate them for smallpox...every single one of them to my knowledge. WE are not vaccinated for smallpox - something to consider. I don't know whether people can be vaccinated for Tuberculosis or not...it's a bacterial infection, not a virus. Enlighten me.
Mexico actually does vaccinate for TB...the US doesn't. The problem is the vaccine--called BCG--is effective only in preventing severe forms of the disease (such as TB meningitis) in infants and young children. It does nothing to prevent infection or development of TB disease in adults. The lesson here is that to prevent TB anywhere, it must be prevented everywhere. It's a common misconception that the US hasn't seen TB in some time. It was the leading cause of death through the 1800s and into the 1900s, and the US experienced an epidemic of TB in the early 1990s because federal funding to control the disease was zeroed out 20 years previous. The New England Journal of Medicine publised a paper late last year showing that the most cost-effective means of preventing TB in the US is to invest in TB control abroad. To invest $35 million in TB control in Mexico, specifically, would save the US $100 million, prevent an additional 2,600 cases of disease and 349 fewer deaths, and save the US $109 million over the next 20 years in comparison to the present US strategy. Slightly more than hallf of people in the US with TB disease (the US saw slightly more than 14,000 cases last year) are foreign-born; 46% were born in the US. Transmission tends to occur within groups--Mexicans transmit the disease to other Mexicans, Vietnamese to Vietnamese, Americans to Americans.