Free Republic

Chicago health officials have announced that a "small number" of tuberculosis (TB) cases have been reported at some migrant facilities following a recent outbreak of measles among migrants living in the Windy City's shelters. The Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) said the TB cases were reported in "a few different shelters" in the city. However, officials did not disclose the exact number of confirmed cases or which shelter locations they originated from, Fox 32 Chicago reports.

CHICAGO (WLS) -- On Tuesday, the Chicago Health Department confirmed there are some cases of tuberculosis among migrants newly arrived in the city. They are not saying exactly how many cases there are, but did say it's a "small number." The city pointed out that many residents of Central America and South America have latent TB infections, which means they can't pass the virus, but it does cause a positive test result. The health department said it is taking steps to keep these infections contained.

On Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, announced that 2023 saw a spike in the number of diagnosed tuberculosis cases in the United States. The spike wasn't tremendous, but given the nature of tuberculosis and its transmissibility, it's a matter of serious concern.The number of U.S. tuberculosis cases in 2023 was the highest in a decade, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has announced. The CDC said on its website Thursday that "overall, cases increased from 8,320 in 2022 to 9,615 in 2023, an increase of 1,295 cases" "The rate also increased from 2.5...

NEW YORK (AP) — The number of U.S. tuberculosis cases in 2023 were the highest in a decade, according to a new government report. Forty states reported an increase in TB, and rates were up among all age groups, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday. More than 9,600 cases were reported, a 16% increase from 2022 and the highest since 2013.

California is facing a steep rise in tuberculosis cases. In 2023, the number of tuberculosis cases increased by 271, or 15%, from 2022, according to California Department of Public Health data released in February. The rate of TB in the Golden State has increased each year since 2020, with it now holding the highest number and one of the highest rates of TB cases in the country. And deaths are also mounting.

A study found that a single dose of Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG), the vaccine for tuberculosis (TB), reduced liver tumor burden and extended the survival of mice with liver cancer. The study is the first to show the promising effects of the vaccine in treating liver cancer. Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common type of liver cancer. BCG, the century-old TB vaccine, is considered safe and widely used around the world. BCG is also known to boost the body's immunity. The U.S. FDA has approved it for the treatment of bladder cancer. Yet, the potential effect of BCG in treating...

The Douglas County Health Department (DCHD) and its partners are responding to a confirmed case of active tuberculosis disease (TB) at Westview YMCA. DCHD is investigating more than 500 possible exposures that may have happened at the facility’s drop-in daycare and is working to identify individuals who had close contact with the patient. Those possible exposures would have happened from late spring into late October. The Douglas County Health Department is investigating the patient’s activities while they were contagious to learn of potential exposures, helping the patient isolate, and observing them complete their medication until they test negative for TB....

Thousands of young illegal immigrants with tuberculosis were released from U.S. government custody across one year, officials have revealed in a new report. The illegal immigrants, all under 18 years of age, were released to family members or other responsible adults despite having latent tuberculosis infection, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a recent disclosure.The dates of each release were not clear. HHS officials notified state officials from June 1, 2022, to May 31, 2023, of the tuberculosis-positive youth over a web-based system operated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Aurora...

The Biden administration has released thousands of illegal immigrant children infected with tuberculosis into 44 states without any attempt of treating the children.Close to 2,500 children who have been diagnosed with TB have potentially infected thousands of American children within the last year.The new numbers stem from a report from the US Health and Human Services Department.The new report revealed, “The government says it can’t treat the children because they are in custody for a short time and treatment requires three to nine months.”

Much as leftists insist that border controls are all about racism, the reality is that one of the prime reasons to have border controls is to protect against deadly diseases. That’s especially true when people from countries with poor health care cross our borders illegally. (Legal border crossers, of course, must prove their good health.) We’re being reminded of the practical benefit of border controls as news emerges that the Biden administration is welcoming in illegal immigrants with tuberculosis, once the deadliest disease in America. Looking back at American history, you’d think that leftists would be exquisitely sensitive to the...

he government is releasing thousands of illegal immigrant children with latent tuberculosis infections into American communities without assurances of treatment. Nearly 2,500 children with latent infections were released into 44 states over the past year, according to a court-ordered report on how the Health and Human Services Department is treating the children. About 126,000 total were released, indicating an infection rate of 1 in 50 migrant children. The government says it can’t treat the children because they are in custody for a short time and treatment requires three to nine months. HHS releases infected children to sponsors and notifies local...

You probably don’t think a lot about tuberculosis. You probably consider it one of those diseases of the past that we don’t have to worry about anymore. You are, unfortunately, wrong. It is back – courtesy of Joe Biden. There are a great many things about the COVID-19 pandemic about which Americans still disagree. There are also a number about which there is no serious dispute. The disease began its spread in Wuhan, China. Infected individuals then spread this highly infectious virus to the entire planet in a remarkably short span of time. If we had any meaningful public health...

The Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine—which prevents tuberculosis—offers multiple beneficial effects, and it's currently a recommended therapy for non–muscle-invasive bladder cancer. In a new study, treatment with the BCG vaccine was associated with a reduced risk of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias. Although previous research has suggested a link between the BCG vaccine and a lower risk of dementia, studies were limited by size, study design, or analytical methods. To conduct a more robust study, Marc Weinberg, MD, Ph.D., and colleagues followed 6,467 individuals for up to 15 years after they were diagnosed with non–muscle-invasive bladder cancer. The group included 3,388...

People have inhabited the Andes mountains of South America for more than 9,000 years, adapting to the scarce oxygen available at high altitudes, along with cold temperatures and intense ultraviolet radiation. A new genomic study published in the journal iScience suggests that Indigenous populations in present-day Ecuador also adapted to the tuberculosis bacterium, thousands of years before the arrival of Europeans..."We found that selection for genes involved in TB-response pathways started to uptick a little over 3,000 years ago," says Sophie Joseph, first author of the paper. "That's an interesting time because it was when agriculture began proliferating in the...

Scientists from the University of St Andrews reveal a new tuberculosis (TB) therapeutics that could shorten the treatment of the disease by up to two months, potentially saving millions of lives. Dr. Muge Cevik delivered the results of the worldwide TB Alliance's SimpliciTB clinical trial at the 30th annual Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in Seattle on Monday, February 20. Tuberculosis causes about 1 million deaths every year. To change this and save lives, new tools and new treatments are required. Active TB must be treated with a combination of drugs; the most drug-sensitive forms of TB require...

It is estimated that 2 billion people globally suffer from the disease today. But vitamin D can help the immune system fight tuberculosis, a new study concludes. "We have shown that vitamin D improves the immune system's ability to fight the tuberculosis bacterium, Mycobacterium tuberculosis," says Associate Professor Martin Kongsbak-Wismann. Today, tuberculosis is treated with antibiotics, but in the past, many tuberculosis patients were admitted to sanatoriums and made to lie out in the sun. This caused their vitamin D levels to rise. Therefore, researchers have long suspected that vitamin D can help fight tuberculosis. The study showed that the...

Researchers have revealed the face of the 'Connecticut vampire' using forensic facial reconstruction.In 1990, archaeologists excavating a 19th century grave in the town of Giswold, located in Connecticut, United States, found that the human remains were arranged to form skull and crossbones, a practice performed during The New England Vampire Panic to prevent a suspected vampire from rising from the grave.The New England Vampire Panic was a period of terror and mass hysteria during the 19th century, caused by an outbreak of consumption that was blamed on vampires.Consumption, known today as tuberculosis (TB), is an infectious disease caused by the...

Combing through the Amazon wilderness, archeologists made an amazing discovery: artifacts of ancient seafaring people from the Iberian Peninsula. They may have fled the carnage of the Roman Empire's war on Carthage, called by some historians the Roman holocaust. This documentary investigates the claim that South America was discovered and settled by Mediterranean peoples over 2,000 years ago.The Mystery Of Carthaginians In The Americas | Lost WarriorsTimeline - World History Documentaries | October 20, 2022

Tuberculosis Makes Comeback in US Amid Misdiagnosis and Illegal Immigration One of the world’s leading killer infectious diseases—tuberculosis (TB)— is surging in the United States with cases rising more than 9 percent last year alone. At present, an estimated 13 million people are living in the United States with latent TB infections, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). TB kills upwards of 12 percent of its victims. Some of the underlying causes contributing to the recent spike in cases are misdiagnosis as COVID-19 by healthcare professionals and the ongoing migration crisis at the U.S. southern border....

Cedars-Sinai Research Raises Possibility That a Century-Old Vaccine May Be Useful Against Coronavirus A widely used tuberculosis vaccine is associated with reduced likelihood of contracting COVID-19 (coronavirus), according to a new study by Cedars-Sinai. The findings raise the possibility that a vaccine already approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration may help prevent coronavirus infections or reduce severity of the disease. The vaccine, known as Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG), was developed between1908 and 1921 and is administered to more than 100 million children around the world every year. In the U.S., it is FDA-approved as a drug to treat bladder...