Photo: Kim Tunnicliffe/WBZ NewsRadio
BROCKTON, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio) — Doctors at the Neighborhood Health Center in Brockton are encouraging migrants to get tested for tuberculosis.
The disease is endemic in a number of countries.
According to the World Health Organization, TB comes from a kind of bacteria that spreads through the air when infected people cough, sneeze or spit.
You must be in close contact with someone with untreated TB disease of the lungs for a long period of time and need to breathe in TB germs for infection to occur.
Brockton tends to have about double the state average of active TB cases.
The center's COO Jessica Prince said many people are walking around with the non-contagious form of the disease and don't even know it. "Latent TB is when you've been exposed before but it's not active in your system," she said. "We do want to treat it with a pill daily as we monitor your liver enzymes monthly to prevent the disease from becoming active."
WBZ's Kim Tunnicliffe (@KimWBZ) reports.
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