The county’s Tuberculosis Program is working to notify residents, employees, contractors and volunteers potentially exposed to tuberculosis at Father Joe’s Joan Kroc Center.
The dates of potential exposure are from Oct. 13 to March 13. This notification is not associated with a separate TB exposure that occurred in November 2023 at a different shelter operated by Father Joe’s Villages, according to a county statement.
TB is an airborne disease that is transmitted from person-to-person through inhalation of the bacteria from the air. The bacteria spreads when someone sick with TB coughs, speaks, sings or breathes. People with frequent and prolonged indoor exposure to a person who is sick with TB should get tested.
“Symptoms of active TB include persistent cough, fever, night sweats and unexplained weight loss,” Dr. Wilma Wooten, county public health officer, said in a statement. “Most people who become infected after exposure to tuberculosis do not get sick right away. This is called latent TB infection. Some who become infected with tuberculosis will become ill in the future, sometimes even years later if their latent TB infection is not treated.”
She added that blood tests and skin tests are effective in determining whether someone has been infected.
According to the county, those without shelter are at increased risk for a variety of reasons, including being in crowded settings, lack of access to healthcare and existing medical conditions.
While the rate of TB is much higher among homeless people, cases in San Diego County show that 90% of people of those diagnosed with TB have not been on the streets.
Taking medicines for latent TB infection can prevent those who test positive from ever contracting active TB disease.
According to the health agency, there were 192 TB cases in the county in 2020, 201 in 2021 and 208 in 2022.
An estimated 175,000 people in the county have a latent TB infection and are at risk for developing active TB. People who test positive for TB, but who do not have symptoms of active TB, should get a chest X-ray and talk to a medical provider.
For more information on this case, call the county TB Control Program at 619-692-5565.
– City News Service