Tuberculosis Los Angeles

Tuberculosis has an uncanny ability to ensure its own spread and survival. It oftens fools doctors and patients into thinking it is a cold, the flu or bronchitis. By the time the symptoms--fatigue, loss of appetite, night sweats and the hacking cough most people associate with TB--are correctly diagnosed, others may have been infected, by breathing the bacteria expelled every time the patient coughed or sneezed.

Tuberculosis has an uncanny ability to ensure its own spread and survival. It oftens fools doctors and patients into thinking it is a cold, the flu or bronchitis. By the time the symptoms--fatigue, loss of appetite, night sweats and the hacking cough most people associate with TB--are correctly diagnosed, others may have been infected, by breathing the bacteria expelled every time the patient coughed or sneezed.

Travon Williams is in a hurry. Tuberculosis is outpacing him. He scurries about Skid Row in a gray minivan, peering down Crack Alley, trudging up five flights of stairs in a roach-infested hotel. In these dark and neglected corners of the city, the disease lurks silently. It is more communicable than AIDS and as ancient as the Egyptian mummies. In 20th-Century Los Angeles, as during the time of the Pharaohs, tuberculosis is spreading fast. Williams is trying to stop it.

Travon Williams is in a hurry. Tuberculosis is outpacing him. He scurries about Skid Row in a gray minivan, peering down Crack Alley, trudging up five flights of stairs in a roach-infested hotel. In these dark and neglected corners of the city, the disease lurks silently. It is more communicable than AIDS and as ancient as the Egyptian mummies. In 20th-Century Los Angeles, as during the time of the Pharaohs, tuberculosis is spreading fast. Williams is trying to stop it.

All incoming kindergarten students and older pupils transferring to Los Angeles County schools will be required to undergo tuberculosis skin testing beginning this fall, health officials announced. About 200,000 students will be affected by the new policy, meant to help eradicate Los Angeles' persistently high tuberculosis rate. Los Angeles-area residents suffer from tuberculosis at nearly twice the national rate, partly because of the large immigrant communities in the county, said Dr. Paul T.

Nine people tested positive for exposure to tuberculosis in a skin-test screening of 92 students and instructors at Orange Coast College last week, a county health official said Tuesday. The number is below what one would expect in an ethnically diverse population such as Orange Coast's, and does not indicate any sort of health problem at the college, said Dr. Penny Weismuller, disease control manager at the Orange County Health Care Agency.

Los Angeles County is failing in its efforts to control its growing tuberculosis epidemic, according to a task force of public health officials and physicians, who say that tuberculosis-control efforts have actually declined as cases have increased.

All incoming kindergarten students and older pupils transferring to Los Angeles County schools will be required to undergo tuberculosis skin testing beginning this fall, county health officials announced Wednesday. About 200,000 students will be affected by the new policy, meant to help eradicate Los Angeles' persistently high tuberculosis rate. Los Angeles area residents suffer from tuberculosis at nearly twice the national rate, due in part to the large immigrant communities in the county, Dr.

Longevity seems to smile fondly on those in the arts. Despite the stresses and strains of creativity, and quite possibly because of the way the challenges keep the blood pumping, the men and women of the lively arts have a way of staying lively. Hal Roach, who teamed Laurel and Hardy and launched the "Our Gang" comedies, recently celebrated his 98th birthday and remains feisty as ever.

Doug Elliott's choices were predictably conventional when he established his first charitable trust about a decade ago: Upon his death the proceeds would go to the hospital that cured him of tuberculosis, a Los Angeles junior college and the Boy Scouts. Convention has since gone out the window. Elliott, a retired Los Angeles school principal, now is leaving the bulk of his estate to gay and AIDS causes. His transformation into gay benefactor reflects a carefully nurtured trend.

A study released today predicts that passage of Proposition 187, the anti-illegal immigrant initiative, will hasten the spread of tuberculosis in California because immigrants will be afraid of contacts with medical authorities.

Those who say Los Angeles has no past are in error. Founded in 1781, Los Angeles is among the oldest of our North American cities. Its history, moreover, has become increasingly popular as a guide to its future. Since Los Angeles' future is in a very real way the American future as well, this city's history, linked to the development of contemporary Los Angeles, is on the verge of becoming a national concern, such as the history of New York City has always been.