Army studying 1st Infantry Division’s unusually high rates of TB exposure

[unhappycamper]

Army studying 1st Infantry Division’s unusually high rates of TB exposure
By Steve Liewer, Stars and Stripes
European edition, Tuesday, July 12, 2005

WÜRZBURG, Germany — Army medical officials are investigating why an unusually high percentage of 1st Infantry Division troops have tested positive for exposure to the lung disease tuberculosis after returning this spring from Iraq.

Dr. (Maj.) James Mancuso, chief of epidemiology for the Center for Health Promotion and Preventative Medicine-Europe, said 4 percent to 5 percent of deployed 1st ID troops reacted positively in the tuberculin skin test all of them received when they came home. During previous deployments to Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo, he said, about 1 percent or 2 percent typically have been exposed.

Mancuso said a positive skin test is no cause for alarm.

“They are not infectious. They can’t transmit it to anyone else,” Mancuso said. “The bacteria is just lying there in lungs.”

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http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=30305

[LiberalFighter]

1. Wasn't there a plan by the UN to give TB shots to Iraqis

before gw*dipshit decided to invade Iraq?

[Spinzonner]

2. Gee, do you suppose it might have anything to do with

starving the medical infrastructure during sanctions and then stressing and destroying it with an attack and insurgency ?