By Elizabeth Lee Vliet, MD
Physician 2014 Ellis Island Medal of Honor, Past Director of AAPS, (See full bio at the bottom of this release)
Preview:
- 35% of refugees in Vermont test positive for latent TB, yet officials are silent on how many have active, infectious TB
- 22%, or one in every 5 refugees resettled in Minnesota by the federal government tested positive for TB in 2014
- Recently, two hospital workers in Minnesota tested positive for active TB, and may have exposed more than 140 patients.
- 18% of all refugees resettled in Arizona have latent TB on arrival. Arizona identified 222 cases of TB among refugees whose latent TB became active and infectious.
- Most Americans do not even know about TB, much less have awareness of their rapidly increasing risk of being exposed to someone with TB because of the hundreds of thousands of refugees now being dispersed across the US.
- individuals with known active disease are sent to communities across America
- Why are refugees carrying deadly disease organisms sent to American cities? Why are infected refugees not quarantined and treated before being resettled in our communities?















