[CTRL] TB in Cattle
-Caveat Lector-
From http://www.guardian.co.uk/footandmouth/story/0,7369,687632,00.html
And the beat goes on. I just don't get it. Animal husbandry has been an integral
part of human culture for aeons and for all the quarantines and restrictions that the
English have had on foreign animals for years and years, they keep getting worse
outbreaks of disease than nations who actually have rabies and such. Karma?
}}}Begin
Cattle TB could hit foot and mouth level
James Meikle
Saturday April 20, 2002
The Guardian
Farmers yesterday expressed fears that TB in cattle could become worse than the
foot and mouth epidemic. Evidence suggests that the disease, which should not
pose a major risk to people, is still spreading quickly in parts of Britain.
Ten beef cattle were culled at a farm in Denbighshire, north Wales, this week, the
first time TB has reached that part of the country. In the first three months of this
year, nearly 800 cattle on 130 farms in Wales tested positive and were slaughtered.
During the whole of 2000, 150 farms in Wales were affected by new TB cases.
Testing was suspended during most of the foot and mouth crisis, but has been
reintroduced.
The disease has been spreading for years, and the government has sparked anger
among wildlife campaigners by culling badgers to establish whether the popular
animals can be blamed for the sharp rise in cases in recent years.
Alan Morris, of the Farmers Union of Wales, said the organisation was deeply
worried that TB in cattle could get out of control and become worse than the foot
and mouth crisis.
Tony Edwards, chief veterinary officer for Wales, was worried by the spread to a new
area. We need to establish how it got there. We have tried to get the message to
farmers buying livestock to ensure the animals are not infected.
The latest figures for Britain as a whole, covering January and February, suggest 184
herds were confirmed as having new TB cases, 147 in England, 34 in Wales and
three in Scotland. This was fewer than the 311 in the first two months of last year,
and 478 cases for all of 2001. Unlike foot and mouth cases, only affected animals
are slaughtered, although others are put under restrictions and tested again two
months later.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
End{{{
~~~
Forwarded as information only; no automatic endorsement
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material
is distributed without charge or profit to those who have
expressed a prior interest in receiving this type of information
for non-profit research and educational purposes only.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe
simply because it has been handed down for many generations. Do not
believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do
not believe in anything simply because it is written in Holy Scriptures. Do not
believe in anything merely on the authority of Teachers, elders or wise men.
Believe only after careful observation and analysis, when you find that it
agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all.
Then accept it and live up to it.
The Buddha on Belief, from the Kalama Sutta
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will
teach you to keep your mouth shut.
--- Ernest Hemingway
A HREF=http://www.ctrl.org/;www.ctrl.org/A
DECLARATION DISCLAIMER
==
CTRL is a discussion informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic
screeds are unwelcomed. Substancenot soap-boxingplease! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright fraudsis used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
Archives Available at:
http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html
A HREF=http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html;Archives of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]/A
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
A HREF=http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/;ctrl/A
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
[CTRL] TB 2B
-Caveat Lector- From www.wsws.org WSWS : News Analysis : Europe : Britain TB threat grows in Britain By Barry Mason 26 July 2001 Back to screen version| Send this link by email | Email the author Medical experts are warning about the developing threat of tuberculosis (TB) in Britain, and especially in London. The Annual Public Health Report 2000/2001 produced by the East London The City Health Authority highlights some of the conditions that have enabled TB to take a hold. Entitled Health in the East End, the report points out that under a third of the cases were among people who had lived in the area for less than five years. It showed that boroughs with high numbers of notified TB cases, such as Newham, Tower Hamlets and Hackney, were also those with higher than average levels of deprivation. Homelessness is another factor. The report states that 25 percent of homeless people in London are infected with TB, however only around 2.5 percent show symptoms of the disease. The three boroughs mentioned above also include high numbers of homeless people. The incidence of HIV associated with TB is estimated at 7- 8 percent in London, but the report points out this is probably an underestimate. From blood tests on pregnant women, Newham and Hackney have a higher HIV incidence than the London average. A detailed analysis of TB cases in London has shown that 50 percent of sufferers were unemployed, five percent had experienced homelessness, over seven percent abused alcohol and seven percent were infected with HIV. The nature of the tuberculosis bacterium, with its waxy coating of fatty acids and lipids (fats), means it needs persistent and consistent antibiotic treatment. The drugs need to be taken for a period of six to nine months. The report states, Sticking to and completing a course of TB treatment is challenging in East London. High population mobility, poverty, alcoholism, substance abuse and cultural barriers make completion of a drug regimen difficult. Amongst the measures the report calls for are: * An adequately resourced TB service and infrastructure, including appropriate ratios of TB specialist nurses and support staff to notifications. * Specially constructed negative-pressure wards with an artificially maintained air pressure lower than that outside to contain the TB bacteria, which can be spread through the air. * Effective infection control arrangements to ensure infectious and drug-resistant cases of TB are managed appropriately. * A research programme on the specific barriers to compliance that affect TB patients in East London. In July this year, London family doctors (GPs) have warned of the dangers of a developing TB epidemic in the capital. This is a disaster waiting to happen. It is only a matter of time until London sees a serious out-break such as that in Leicester earlier this year, said Dr Stewart Drage, secretary to several London GP committees. Dr Michael Soljak, Director of Public Health for Ealing, Hammersmith and Hounslow said that although three extra nurses had been recruited to work with the TB cases this was not enough to keep up with the rising levels of the disease. He said the increased number of nurses would have been enough if we hadnt seen the increase in cases. What we have found is that we are barely keeping up with the disease. In July 2000, Professor John Grange of the Centre for Infectious Disease at University College London said London had become a hotspot for the disease, and called for the number of specialist TB nurses to be increased to a level of one nurse to every 50 notified cases of the disease. The Department of Health dismissed his claim that the situation in Britain was waiting for human disaster. Improvements in health care and the widespread use of antibiotics meant that TB was all but eradicated in the UK by the 1960s. In 1999, the Labour government abandoned the routine vaccination programme for school children with the long established BCG vaccine, but this has now been resumed in London with plans to restore it nationwide. Since 1987 there has been a resurgence of the disease. In 1990, there were 1,600 cases in England and Wales. By 1999 there were 7,000 cases, with the biggest rise being amongst the 25-64 age group. In 2000, nearly 400 people died of the disease nation-wide. By 2001, the number of cases in Britain has risen to nearly 7,500, of which 3,000 were in London. In London 50 new cases are currently diagnosed each week. Commenting on the increase in TB cases in London, Dr Heather Milburn, a chest physician at Guys and St Thomas Hospital, said, Those of us who look after TB patients may find were not able to cope. Districts in East London have been particularly affected: Newham with 108 cases per 100,000 of its population has made London tuberculosis capital of the affluent Western world. The figures even put it ahead of Russia, where the collapse of the public health system has led to 91 cases per 100,000,
[CTRL] TB Sheet
-Caveat Lector- From www.wsws.org WSWS : News Analysis : Medicine Health TB poses major health threat By Barry Mason 19 July 2001 Back to screen version| Send this link by email | Email the author Tuberculosis, or TB, poses a growing threat to world health. According to an article in the New Scientist magazine, it is estimated that a third of the worlds population carry the disease, but nine out of ten do not show symptoms. It infects one person every four seconds. Eight million people a year develop the disease, of which three million die. According to the charity TB Alert, by 2050 there will be five million deaths a year from the disease. Many of its victims are young. TB is an airborne infection spread by coughing. The disease can affect any part of the body, but is usually sited in the lungs where it slowly destroys tissue. IT is responsible for more deaths than Aids or malaria, but TB combined with HIVthe virus responsible for AIDSis a deadly cocktail, according to TB Alert. HIV increases the risk of developing TB a hundred fold. According to Mario Raglivione, head of the World Health Organisations TB control, virtually the whole of sub-Saharan Africa is infected by TB. As HIV reduces immunity, latent TB infections are triggered by the spread of HIV. The New Scientist article states, HIV is to TB what matches are to kindling, and Africa could be just the start of the wildfire, adding that it is like Ebola with wings. Barry Kreisirth of New York University says, The spread of HIV in India and China where TB is endemic, will be a disaster. In Britain TB infections mushroomed in the 19th century and early 20th century. Rapid industrialisation meant workers malnourished from poverty were thrown together in appalling conditions, enabling TB to spread. The situation now developing in contemporary Russia and Eastern Europe mirrors these circumstances. Economic collapse, with the resultant decimation of health and social care, has led to the explosive increase in the number of TB cases. Again the coincidence with HIV dramatically heightens the scope of the disease. Richard Coker researches TB at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. He has spent time in the former Soviet Union and says, the epidemic of HIV is clashing with TB, which means things could get monumentally out of control. The growing incidence of drug resistant forms has greatly increased the virulence of the disease. Normally the TB bacterium is susceptible to basic antibiotics. However, to completely eradicate the disease in any individual patient requires pro-longed medication. Uncompleted courses of treatment add to the threat of drug resistance. This is happening on a large scale in places such as Russian prisons and could provide the basis for a global spread of drug resistant forms of TB. In her book Betrayal of TrustThe collapse of global public health, Laurie Garrett described the TB epidemic in the former Soviet Union and its neighbours as being out of control. She says that drug-resistant TB has swept over the Russian region. In 1990 the World Health Organisation initiated a programme to control TB. At its launch the aim was to target the 22 worst affected countries, to detect 70 percent of cases and cure 85 percent of this figure by the year 2000. The treatment given by the scheme is known as a Direct Observed Treatment Short Course (DOTS). It involves supervising the patient to ensure the full medication course is completed. Compliance with the medication regime is vital. Mohta Smith, an expert on drugs and poverty at Oxfam, says, Much as DOTS is a good programme its very difficult to get people to comply. Tom Frieden who was the former head of New Yorks eradication programme said, A poorly run programme can create multidrug resistant TB faster than you can eradicate TB. But the New Scientist reports that Peru and Vietnam have met the target. With just one person in five having access to the necessary antibiotics, the programme is unviable. Fully 75 percent of the costs of the medication has to be met by the impoverished countries in the scheme. According to Garrett, drug resistant TB is now gaining hold in Peru. She quotes a letter written in 1997 by Harvard University TB expert Dr Paul Farmer, then working in Peru. Farmer writes that, We have been able to identify the process by which poor Peruvians become sick with drug-resistant TB: inequalities in access to effective treatment are producing a vicious cycle which permits the emergence and transmission of this deadly disease. According to Dr Farmer the drug-resistant form of TB had become established in over 100 countries by 1999. There is no meaningful research and development being undertaken to find new drugs or a vaccine to fight the TB threat. The existing TB vaccine was developed over 80 years ago. Only one new antibiotic, rifapentine, has been developed in the last 30 years. Mohta Smith of Oxfam claims many potential TB drugs are
[CTRL] TB
-Caveat Lector- From http://www.vdare.com/scott_mcconnell_TB.htm http://www.vdare.com/scott_mcconnell_TB_canadian.htm }}Begin Send us your TB carriers... Disease is the Achilles Heel of the open-borders crowd. Contrary to their apparent imagining, there was rigorous official screening of immigrants back in the Ellis Island era: 1-3 percent of them were turned back every year. With 1-3 million illegal border crossings every year, nothing like these safeguards exist now. This may be the unreported story of West Nile Disease. It is certainly the unreported story of Americas much touted but unhistorical commitment to refugees. By Scott McConnell Same story (but worse, of course) in Canada Someone is coughing in the subway, nearby. You can see a half dozen public service ads extolling safe sex, but underground neither morality nor prudence can protect from the germs of your fellow passengers. In a cab with a coughing driver, you can open the window wide, though its December, calculating the risk-reward ration of flu versus tuberculosis. TB is back. Ten years ago, on the heels of the AIDS epidemic, it was rising fast, but effective countermeasuresincluding directly observed therapy and even detention of patients stalled the diseases rise. But now the drugs are weaker, the strains more difficult-sometimes impossible-to cure. And rates are rising. Where is the disease coming from? Our immigration policy, that is courtesy of Bill Clinton, The Wall Street Journal editorial page, La Raza, George W. Bush and dozens other culprits. Listen to Dr. Lee Reichman of the Center for Disease Control. Were now at the level that to control TB anywhere we have to control it everywhere. Were doing a great job with native-born Americans. Were not doing a good job in keeping down the incidence among persons coming into the country. A CDC report notes that immigrants are six times more likely to have TB than Americans, and their rates are rising. VDARE notes that in all of Dr. Reichmans nuanced exposition of the difficulties in diagnosing and treating this long dread disease, he mentions not once the possibility of actually reducing the number of TB carriers who enter the country. December 17, 2000 Canada: The Disease Dimension Disease is the Achilles Heel of the open-borders crowd. Contrary to their apparent imagining, there was rigorous official screening of immigrants back in the Ellis Island era: 1-3 percent of them were turned back every year. With 1-3 million illegal border crossings every year, nothing like these safeguards exist now. This may be the unreported story of West Nile Disease. It is certainly the unreported story of Americas much touted but unhistorical commitment to refugees. By Michael Monastyrskyj Immigrants are bringing tuberculosis to Canada, infecting Canadians with the deadly disease and placing even more strain on the countrys overburdened healthcare system. Recently newspapers in southern Ontario reported that a Caribbean immigrant and his girlfriend had infected at least 14 Canadians with TB. It will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to track down and test all the people the couple had contact with. Canadas immigration system broke down twice. First, the man, who suffered from one of the worst types of TB, should not have been let in. Even under the countrys lax immigration rules, would-be immigrants with active TB are barred until they have been adequately treated in their country of origin. Second, health authorities in Hamilton, Ontario, should have been notified about the mans presence, but say they werent. As a result, he was able to live undetected in the area for a year enough time for to make contact with 1,200 people across southern Ontario, all of whom have to be found, tested and re- tested at taxpayers expense. Hamilton isnt the only Canadian city forced to deal with tuberculosis. Last week in Montreal, a Peruvian refugee claimant with TB and a problem with authority barely avoided jail after repeatedly refusing to take treatment and infecting his ex-girlfriends five-year-old daughter. The man described as belligerent was often too hungover to show up for treatment and even in spat in the face of an ambulance attendant taking him to the hospital. Tuberculosis can be transmitted by saliva. A year ago, the Canadian Employment and Immigration Union complained that there is a definite health threat to its members and the Canadian public, because refugee claimants are not
[CTRL] Fw: [CTRL] TB or Super TB
An old post from Alamaine on the TB situation.
- Original Message -
From: Alamaine
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Thursday, March 23, 2000 4:24 PM
Subject: [CTRL] TB or Super TB
-Caveat Lector- -Cui
Bono?-Another reason for limiting
globalisation and respecting nations' sovereignty. As we may have seen in the
past, the Ruskies don't have much of a care or a hoot to give about their prison
populations. This is reaffirmed in the article below. Something like this
(drug-resistant TB) among homeless wandering bedouin free spirited streetizens
in New York or some other large well-populated places may make some of the other
'bio-terrorist' efforts look tame. And, the means of contracting and spreading
is not very
difficult.Fromhttp://www.cdc.gov/epo/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00031159.htm
Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease caused by the bacterium
Mycobacterium tuberculosis, which is spread almost exclusively by
airborne transmission. Although the disease can affect any site in the
body, it most often affects the lungs. When persons with pulmonary TB
cough, they produce tiny droplet nuclei that contain TB bacteria, which
can remain suspended in the air for prolonged periods of time. Anyone
who breathes air that contains these droplet nuclei can become infected
with TB. A person who becomes infected with the TB
bacillus remains infected for
years. Usually a person with a healthy immune system does not become
ill, but is usually not able to eliminate the infection without taking
an antituberculosis drug. This condition is referred to as "latent
tuberculous infection." Persons with latent tuberculous infection are
asymptomatic and cannot spread TB to others. Generally, a positive TB skin
test is the only evidence of infection. About 10-15 million persons in
this country are infected with M. tuberculosis. About 10% of otherwise
healthy persons who have latent tuberculous infection will become ill
with active TB at some time during their lives.This has some potential for
returning the world to a medieval / feudal state in that the class systems can
become once more very pronounced and strictly enforced. Donate to the World Bank
freely and often!!! AER From
NewsMax.Com{{Begin}}NewsMax.comAdvertise Your Banner
HereDrug-Resistant TB Being Spread From Russian PrisonsNew York Times
SyndicateMarch 23, 2000MOSCOW -- From behind the crumbling
yellow-brick walls of the Holding-Cell No. 1 prison complex, a deadly epidemic
is slowly being loosed upon an unsuspecting world.That epidemic is not
crime. It is tuberculosis.Russian jails are TB incubators. Every year,
tens of thousands of infected inmates are released from this country's
notoriously overcrowded prisons into society.Compounding the problem, a
powerful new form of tuberculosis, resistant to conventional treatments, is
spreading here, sparking fears that a new epidemic could threaten not only
Russia, but Europe and the United States.Moscow has acknowledged that it
lacks the financial resources to fight TB on its own, and has begun allowing
unprecedented access to its penal system. The West, faced with a possible new TB
threat, has offered financial assistance.``Tuberculosis isn't a private
matter, nor is it the internal business of any one country. It is a problem
without borders,'' said Alexander Goldfarb of the Public Health Research
Institute, which is developing a program to help Russia contain its TB
problem.Monday, officials at Moscow's main city jail, nicknamed
``Sailors' Quietude,'' held an open house for Western diplomats and journalists.
Guests toured previously off-limits cells and treatment centers as pale and thin
TB-infected inmates, most dressed in sweatpants and T-shirts, coughed and peered
up from their cots.Although the prison is among Russia's best equipped,
it is woefully understaffed. A doctor on duty, who refused to give her name,
said the prison hospital has just one physician for every 88 TB
patients.Of the 5,200 inmates in the facility, 623 have full-blown
tuberculosis. Nationally, in other prison facilities, the situation is not much
better.Health care officials estimate that 100,000 out of a prison
population of 1 million have active TB. One in four of these have a potent new
drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis, called MDR TB.About 300,000
Russians are sent to prison annually, and each year the same number are
released. According to various estimates, anywhere from 10,000 to 30,000 of
those released each year have full-blown TB.``Our city jails are
revolving doors. . .and the focal points of the TB epidemic,'' said Colonel
Alexander Kononets, head of the medical service for Russia's
prisons.Predictably, TB has spread among the Russian population at a
staggering rate. According to official statistics, there are 440,000 cases of
active TB in Russia. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, reported
cases of the disease have more than double
[CTRL] TB or not TB Globalised
This, THIS, is a primary example of *why* borders and sovereignty should be protected. AER From www.wsws.org WSWS : News Analysis : Medicine Health Drug-resistant tuberculosis threatens millions By Debra Watson 16 May 2000 Back to screen version The super-deadly strains of drug-resistant tuberculosis that killed 500 people in New York City in the early 1990s are now turning up in alarming numbers in the underdeveloped countries. Each year over 2 million people, mostly poor, die from the disease. Just 22 countries, designated high burden countries, account for 80 percent of the world's tuberculosis cases. These include China, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia, Russia and the Philippines. Of new TB cases, fully 95 percent are in the underdeveloped world. One third of the people in the world are believed to carry the tuberculosis microbe. Of the estimated 2 billion infected, one in ten are expected to develop active tuberculosis at some time in their lives. The bacterial infection can live for years in its host, causing chronic debilitation, and is often fatal. Drug treatment has been available for over 50 years that can easily kill susceptible strains of the bacteria, yet even at a cost of $10 per patient in the underdeveloped world, treatment remains out of reach for millions. It costs $5,000 per patient to treat the new drug-resistant strains and multidrug-resistant strains are often incurable even with modern antibiotics. Drug resistance is a wholly man-made phenomenon. Selective mutation of the microbe burden in a host results from inadequate or intermittent drug supply for the patient or from the misuse of available anti-tuberculosis drugs. Health workers fear that the high cost of treating drug-resistant strains will be impossible in countries already reeling from several epidemics of infectious disease as well as social and political factors such as war, massive poverty and inequality and economic crisis. "Our biggest worry is that drug-resistant TB will also begin increasing in other developing countries," said Dr. David Heymann, executive director of Communicable Diseases for the World Health Organization (WHO). "North America and Europe may have the billions of dollars required to contain this emergency. The worst affected countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America do not," Heymann added. During the five years of the New York City epidemic it cost over $1 billion to treat approximately 3,800 patients and to contain further spread of the deadly strains in the US. WHO estimates 50 million people worldwide are already infected with drug- resistant tuberculosis. There are several hot spots in the world where multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) makes up more than 3 percent of new TB cases. Growing numbers of drug-resistant tuberculosis cases apparently are being contracted directly through breathing the same air as a person already sick from a resistant strain. Researchers believe a person with TB infects another 10 to 15 people each year he remains ill. In Estonia nearly 37 percent of new TB cases were resistant to at least one drug. Resistance to all four drugs tested was 8.5 percent among new tuberculosis patients there and the country also had the highest level of MDR- TB of any area of the world in TB patients who had never before been treated14.1 percent. MDR-TB is defined as resistance to at least the drugs Isoniazid and Rifampicin. MDR-TB in new cases was also found in large numbers in Henan province in China, 10.8 percent and Latvia, 9 percent. In Russia in Ivanovo Oblast it was also 9 percent and in Tomsk Oblast it was 6.5 percent, well above the global median of 1 percent. Iran also had high levels, 5.8 percent of new tuberculosis cases were resistant to at least two drugs. Estonia is also a documented example of increasing levels of drug resistance. In 1998 the percentage of patients with MDR-TB who had been previously treated for tuberculosis was 37.8 percent, up from 19.2 percent in 1994. Anti-tuberculosis drug-resistance in the world, Report No. 2 follows up on a 1997 report from WHO and the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease. Researchers now warn that unchecked epidemics in underdeveloped countries will spill over into more affluent countries. Already in the earlier report they documented cases of MDR-TB in every one of 35 geographical areas surveyed between 1994 and 1996, and on every continent. Transnational tuberculosis, spread across the world in human hosts via global travel, is suspected as the cause of rising drug-resistant TB and the more dangerous multidrug-resistant TB in Europe and other countries with few overall cases. In Germany and Denmark the percentage of TB patients resistant to a single drug has increased by 50 percent since 1996. It doubled in one year in New Zealand. Germany is currently treating over 100 cases of MDR-TB. MDR-TB was not found to be any more prevalent among immigrants than in natives of
[CTRL] Tb or not TB / Heartfelt
-Caveat Lector- From the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_45/450791.stm Friday, September 17, 1999 Published at 23:45 GMT 00:45 UK Picture Picture World: Europe Picture Russian TB threatens the world Picture One in 10 Russian prisoners is thought to have TB Picture By Madrid Correspondent Daniel Schweimler World experts in the treatment of tuberculosis have warned that the disease in Russian prisons is a timebomb waiting to go off. Speaking in Madrid at the International Conference on Lung Health, they said that unless urgent measures are taken to stop what they call "the prison TB pump", the incidence of the disease in Russia will keep growing and inevitably spread to the rest of the world. The incidence of tuberculosis in Russia has more than doubled since 1991 and a quarter of those cases are in Russian prisons. TB breeding grounds The conditions in these under-heated, under-resourced, overcrowded buildings is ideal for the spread of the disease, which is killing about 5,000 prisoners a year. Picture: [ image: Scientists are testing traditional herbal remedies as they search for new cures]Scientists are testing traditional herbal remedies as they search for new cures The head of Russia's prison medical service, Colonel Alexander Conets, told delegates that thanks to a greater openness in Russian society, they could firstly admit that there is a problem and secondly seek help in trying to deal with it. But 100,000 prisoners are released from Russian jails every year, many of them infected with TB. Lee Reichman from the National Tuberculosis Centre in the United States said the problem would not remain confined to Russia. "Tuberculosis is an infectious disease, it spreads from person to person," he said. "So it must spread and it's being incubated in Russian prisons, and unless we do something about this incubation, when it gets out it's going to be a disaster." Resistance spells danger But what is also worrying health experts is the increase of a new form of drug resistant TB which has developed because of widespread misuse of antibiotics. This new strain of the disease is expensive to treat and is also finding a perfect breeding-ground in Russian jails. Picture: [ image: Cold, crowded and underfunded - Russian prisons provide ideal conditions for spreading TB]Cold, crowded and underfunded - Russian prisons provide ideal conditions for spreading TB A number of international organisations, with the backing of the World Health Organisation (Who), have launched a pilot project in the central Russian region of Tomsk to try to deal with this new strain of TB. It is expensive and there are fears that funding for the project could be misused. Hopefully the World Bank is going to come in with a major loan, but the local problems in Russia - where there's currently chaos and worse - will make it difficult to receive the loan or use it properly," said Mr Reichman. According to speakers at the conference, there is no time to lose - the accelerating spread in Russian prisons of HIV, the virus that can lead to Aids, will they say lead to an explosion of TB among inmates. The message from the Madrid conference is clear: that as we enter the new century, Western countries and international organisations must provide the commitment and the financial resources to address public health threats on a global scale. From the Telegraph (UK) www.telegraph.co.uk ISSUE 1576Saturday 18 September 1999 Hearts taken from 11,000 babies By Sean O'Neill HOSPITALS have removed and retained, without parents' consent, the hearts of at least 11,000 children who died of cardiac disease in the past 40 years. Large collections of damaged and malformed hearts are stored at major hospitals across the country. The organs were removed from the bodies of children during post mortem examinations for which consent was given. But permission was not sought from families to store the hearts for decades to carry out medical research. Relatives did not know that they were burying their children without their hearts. The largest collection is held at Alder Hey Children's Hospital in Liverpool, which has amassed 2,500 hearts since the late 1950s. In London, the Royal Brompton Hospital and Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital have catalogued and stored some 2,000 hearts each. There are 1,500 kept in Birmingham and a further 1,000 in Leeds. Hospitals in Southampton, Newcastle, Manchester and Bristol have retained about 500 each. The widespread practice of tissue retention came to light following the scandal of high death rates in paediatric cardiac surgery at the Bristol Royal Infirmary. Helen Rickard, who uncovered the practice when she discovered that her daughter Samantha had been buried without her heart, will give evidence on Monday to the public inquiry into events at Bristol. Mrs Rickard, whose
[CTRL] TB
-Caveat Lector- From wsws.org WSWS : News Analysis : Medicine Health Interview with an Australian specialist Tuberculosis: a deadly epidemic out of control By Peter Symonds 11 December 1998 Alarming statistics on the spread of tuberculosis were presented in a World Health Organisation report, entitled TB--A Crossroads, released last month at an international conference in Bangkok on lung disease. Despite the availability of cheap and highly effective treatment methods, nearly three million people are dying from TB each year around the world. Newly-appointed WHO director-general Gro Harlem Brundtland told the conference: "A disease that many of us believed would disappear in our lifetime is killing more people today than at any time in our history." Five years ago WHO declared the resurgence of tuberculosis an emergency. Since then the disease has spread from Africa to Asia. According to the WHO report, six Asian countries--India, China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia and the Philippines--were responsible for 56 percent of the eight million tuberculosis cases reported last year. TB is also reaching danger levels in Russia and Eastern Europe. Three main causes were identified for the epidemic: 1. The spread of HIV, which attacks the body's immune system, is greatly increasing the number of active TB cases capable of infecting others. 2. Badly-administered drug treatments and interruptions to drug supplies have led to a rapid growth of multi-drug resistant strains of TB that are difficult and expensive to treat and more likely to be fatal. Only 15 percent of people with the disease were treated with the recommended regime of prescribed drugs taken under close monitoring. In 80 percent of areas affected by the disease, drugs are available in pharmacies without prescription or through black market distributors. As a result, TB sufferers are taking drugs without medical guidance, increasing the likelihood of drug resistance occurring. 3. The growth of poverty and social dislocation as a result of the economic crisis in Asia and internationally has compounded the problems, interrupting drug supplies and putting treatment beyond the reach of many. Malnutrition and poor health conditions weaken the immune system and increase the likelihood of active TB developing. The World Socialist Web Site interviewed Dr Michael Levy, director of the Community Health and Anti-Tuberculosis Association in Australia, on the growing incidence of HIV and TB in Papua New Guinea. Dr Levy, who attended the Bangkok conference, has recently visited Papua New Guinea on two occasions on WHO's behalf to review the operations of a small pilot anti-TB project in Lae--the only such project in the country. He warns of the dangers of TB and HIV rapidly spreading out of control in PNG due to the breakdown of basic diagnostic services and elementary health care. WSWS: In a recent interview you warned of a HIV/TB epidemic in Papua New Guinea of "African proportions". Can you elaborate? ML: What you have in Africa and what you have in Papua New Guinea is the confluence of high levels of HIV and TB infection. HIV is the single biggest amplifier of tuberculosis. To understand that you need to know that tuberculosis actually occurs in two stages. In the first stage you get infected but at that point you are not infectious. Your immune system can contain the bacterium quite effectively. Then at a later stage in life, only about 5 percent of otherwise healthy people progress to the second phase of tuberculosis, which is destructive of regions of the lungs, coughing of blood, etc. At that point you are highly infectious. HIV accelerates that process. Instead of a 5 percent risk in a lifetime, it becomes something like a 10 percent annual risk. So it is something like a 20, 30, 40 times amplification of the cycle and there is nothing that man has come across up to now that has done that as effectively as HIV. In countries like sub-Saharan Africa and unfortunately PNG, HIV is quite advanced in the community and testing is done so poorly. There is very little that you can do for people with HIV but one can diagnose them and then assess the risks and act accordingly. In PNG testing is no longer widely available and there are reasons for that. People are shutting the testing facilities. Behind the scenes, health care workers aren't getting paid a salary. Aid posts, which were set up and formed a widespread network up to 35 years ago, are closing down. People are just literally not turning up for work any more, so the aid posts aren't being manned. WSWS: What are the reasons for the breakdown of the health system? ML: I am sure it is a complex situation. Part of it is that the money is not coming from the central government through the provincial governments and on to local authorities to pay these field workers. The training of health workers has not continued apace with attrition. Simple courses for the training of medical
