Active Tuberculosis Confirmed at Middle School in Texas

An active case of tuberculosis (TB) has been confirmed at a public middle school in San Antonio, Texas.

“The San Antonio Metropolitan Health District has confirmed an individual case of tuberculosis at Page Middle School, according to a news release sent Monday afternoon,” News 4 reported last week:

The individual has since been removed from campus and will return to school once no longer infectious. The infected person is reportedly in stable condition.

Metro Health and the San Antonio Independent School District are working to identify those who may have been exposed. According to a news release from the city, a letter will be sent to those potentially exposed.

Notification letters were sent to all parents on Monday. All are invited to attend a bilingual tuberculosis presentation on Thursday, May 25 at 5:30 p.m. inside the school auditorium.

“Metro Health and SAISD are working together to identify those individuals at the school who may have been exposed. Letters will be sent to those that may have been potentially exposed,” the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District said in the May 22 news release.

Meanwhile, in North Carolina, “Officials with Cabarrus County Schools say some staff and students at Hickory Ridge High School may recently have been exposed to an individual with Tuberculosis (TB),” the Charlotte Observer reported last week:

“This exposure is likely to have affected a very small number of individuals, and we are working closely with the public health staff at Cabarrus Health Alliance to contact those individuals who may have been exposed and to ensure that they receive appropriate testing and treatment,” school officials said in a letter to parents. “The vast majority of staff and students will not be contacted, and do not need any testing or treatment for TB.”

Officials say while it is important for the entire school to be aware, they reiterated that it was a “relatively small number” of people who were likely exposed.

In Washington state, “A month after a Gig Harbor High School student was diagnosed with tuberculosis, health officials say nobody else at the school contracted the disease,” the News Tribune reported earlier this month:

The student was diagnosed in April and received treatment while staying away from campus. The student did not get TB at school.

Even though the chance of others being infected was low, the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department tested eight students and seven staff members. Test results show none demonstrated signs of the virus, the department announced Friday.

These three most recent cases of active TB reported in middle schools and high schools in the United States add to the number of other cases reported by Breitbart News in Nebraska, Minnesota, California, and South Carolina over the past academic year.

An active case of TB was confirmed at Armijo High School in Fairfield, California in February, as Breitbart News reported at the time:

The Solano County Public Health Department is not saying whether the case of active TB was diagnosed in a student, faculty member, or staff member.

California becomes the latest state to report an active case of TB at a high school or middle school.

In November, a case of active TB was reported at a high school in Nebraska. In December, a case of active TB was reported at a middle school in South Carolina.

Earlier this year, two schools in Minnesota — one a high school, the other a middle school — confirmed active cases of TB.

Many of these cases of active TB have been reported in schools that have a high percentage of students born in other countries who arrived in the United States through the federal refugee resettlement program.

Sixty-seven percent of all cases of active TB confirmed in the United States in 2016 were diagnosed in foreign-born residents, according to the Centers for Disease Control.