Worst TB outbreak in 20 years kept secret
State rushes closure of its only TB hospital in Lantana


By Stacey Singer
Sunday, July 8, 2012
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
www.palmbeachpost.com

JACKSONVILLE -- The CDC officer had a serious warning for
Florida health officials in April: A tuberculosis outbreak
in Jacksonville was one of the worst his group had
investigated in 20 years. Linked to 13 deaths and 99
illnesses, including six children, it would require
concerted action to stop.

That report had been penned on April 5, exactly nine days
after Florida Gov. Rick Scott signed the bill that shrank
the Department of Health and required the closure of the
A.G. Holley State Hospital in Lantana, where tough
tuberculosis cases have been treated for more than 60
years.

As health officials in Tallahassee turned their focus to
restructuring, Dr. Robert Luo's 25-page report describing
Jacksonville's outbreak -- and the measures needed to
contain it - went unseen by key decision makers around the
state. At the health agency, an order went out that the TB
hospital must be closed six months ahead of schedule.

Had they seen the letter, decision makers would have
learned that 3,000 people in the past two years may have
had close contact with contagious people at Jacksonville's
homeless shelters, an outpatient mental health clinic and
area jails. Yet only 253 people had been found and
evaluated for TB infection, meaning Florida's outbreak
was, and is, far from contained.

The public was not to learn anything until early June,
even though the same strain was appearing in other parts
of the state, including Miami.

for the rest of this, go to
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/news/state-regional/worst-tb-outbreakin-20-years-kept-secret/nPpLs/

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