TB Prevention and Control Imperative

* This letter is in response to your editorial “L.A. County’s Fiscal Demands vs. TB” (Oct. 2). As chair of the TB Coalition in Orange County, I concur with the urgent need to improve tuberculosis control and prevention. We in Orange County have been going through similar woes, and despite the county bankruptcy the Board of Supervisors has made TB and AIDS priorities.

In the current political climate, discriminatory attitudes toward people of color and the undocumented may lead to service cuts. A decline in health care for the poor compounds the problem. We cannot ignore the impact of TB and the growing problem it presents. Increased education of physicians, public education, prophylactic medicines for the infected and directly observed therapy for the infectious are an absolute must.

The American Lung Assn. of Orange County has formed a coalition to address these issues and advocate for appropriate public health measures, while working with the Health Care Agency and the communities of highest risk. We have seen the results of less than adequate measures in New York and other areas where TB is now resistant to mainstream drugs and epidemics occur in hospitals, jails and schools.

TB is not the threat it was at the turn of the century. We know how to prevent and treat it. Surely it makes sense to use the proverbial ounce of prevention in this case or we will need millions of dollars in the future to control this insidious disease.

PEARL JEMISON-SMITH, R.N.

Chair, TB Coalition, Orange County

Garden Grove