No new active cases of tuberculosis found at Homewood High School
No new active cases of tuberculosis have been found so far at Homewood High School, Jefferson County Department of Health officials say, for the first time revealing results of tests conducted of students and employees of the school after a ninth-grader was diagnosed with the deadly, contagious respiratory disease in March.
In all, 36 Homewood High School students and three employees out of the more than 1,200 examined had positive tuberculosis skin tests, but Dr. Ed Khan stressed that there is no cause for alarm because they had what is called “latent tuberculosis,” a dormant form that is not contagious.
“We have found a total of 36 students and three employees who have positive TB skin tests, which may indicate that they’ve been exposed at some time in their life to TB,” Khan said during an April 22 press conference. "Their chest X-rays are normal and they have no symptoms.”
Khan, medical director of disease control, said none of the 36 students and three employees who had positive skin tests had close contact with the student.
“None of them are in the student’s class, so we actually feel that they’re probably unrelated to the case,” Khan said.
He said the Jefferson County Department of Health plans to retest individuals at Homewood High School the week of May 18 before school breaks for the summer, adding that tuberculosis is a slow-developing disease that typically takes eight to 12 weeks for symptoms to show up.
On March 25 during a meeting at the school system office, Homewood Schools Superintendent Bill Cleveland told about 50 concerned parents that 960 of the 1,060 students at Homewood High School and 169 employees were tested for tuberculosis.
Khan said the county health department appreciates the cooperation and assistance of the Homewood school system in the investigation “and their working diligently to provide accurate information to parents in a timely manner.”
For more information on TB, visit the CDC's website.
More coverage of the TB case at Homewood High: