Timebomb : The Global Epidemic of Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis

by Lee Reichman, Janice Hopkins Tanne

Tuberculosis, once called the romantic disease of the nineteenth century, has now returned, reaching epidemic proportions worldwide. One only need remember the much reported New York City epidemic in 1991. Now, the tuberculosis rate in New York City is 19.9 cases per 100,000 individuals - that's three times the national reate of 6.4 per 100,000. 15 million Americans are infected with tuberculosis. The alarm sounded by Reichman and Tanne should be taken seriously: TB a respiratory disease that can prove fatal, is highly infections, airborne and passed through breathing. Although tuberculosis can be treated, the regimen is long and strict, sometimes lasting up to nine months. Still worse, at present, we are now faced with a newer strain which is referred to as Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis (MDR-TB).

MDR-TB has developed largely out of the misuse of antibiotics used to treat tuberculosis, which must be taken under a strict regimen and overseen by a health-care professional. If the plan is not followed and the antibiotics discontinued before the requisite time, the TB will recur and be resistant to the drugs used to treat it: it has formed an immunity to the antibiotics. This resistant form of TB is contagious and has entered the United States, the authors believe, largely through immigrants - most of them from the Former Soviet Union which is considered one of the world's epicenters of TB according to the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) (p. 43, ref. 31). The point is well taken and Reichman and Tanne document their facts well, pointing out hot-spots as determined by the W.H.O. However, at times, the book rings with a certain hysteria and xenophobia, "Just think how many leaga and illegal immegrants from these countries are now in Western countries! And just think, in our global society, how many more are contemplating coming!"