I was talking to my son in law this morning and the subject of tuberculosis came up.
Today we hear very little about TB but not so long ago it took many lives. There were no medications for treating the disease itself. The main treatment was to put patients in a special hospital where they were required to rest. I saw a photo of 12 patients in their beds and someone reading to them. TB spread easily in poor conditions as in housing and cleanliness.
When I was a child they decided that to identify people with TB and put them in hospitals would prevent the spread of TB.
Where I lived they had a regime of X-raying people every year. I remember the big gray trucks. We were all lined up and called in order to have our x-rays done. Because of the x-ray technology of the time, we had to take off our tops. It was a day with some stress as each year they found several people with TB and they were immediately put in the hospital. There was no not getting the x-ray because it was dangerous. All people had the x-ray. Some difference from today. But today we still have covid.
Later other tests were used to detect TB and medications found to treat TB.
When I was in the Arctic in the 60's TB was all too common. It's surprising that I didn't get TB. Aboriginals were sent south to stay in hospitals sometimes for years. On the coasts an icebreaker came in each year and the people were taken to the ship and x-rayed. It was an exciting time to visit the ship but they sadly always found people with TB.
One Inuk I knew, from Baffin Island, had TB as a young person. When he was in the south he got in some school time and they also trained him to be an x-ray technician.
He was assigned to work in an area with Cree people. There was a Cree interpreter who gave instructions . 1. Take a deep Breath, 2 Hold it. 3. Don't move. Elijah , the Inuk technician, got the idea that it would run more smoothly if he could give those instructions . He asked if they would tell him what to say. They told him what to say. He gave the instructions. However, when the women left the x-ray they gave Elijah a funny look. Elijah soon realized he had been had. They had told him correctly for steps one and two , but they changed one word in step three so Elijah was saying "Don't fart" instead of "don't move."
We are all fortunate these days that there is very little TB except in underdeveloped countries.
Since I am elderly , I think many of you would have missed this experience.
I have read that there is a new strain of TB that is difficult to treat and cure, and that it sometimes arrives with people who enter the USA illegally, since their health is not checked at the entry point. When I attended college in Turkey upon my return to the USA I was required to have a TB test just as a precaution. Not a disease anyone would want to encounter.
ReplyDeleteI've seen the same thing about a new strain. Better to test than get the nasty TB.
DeleteI had to smile about Elijah’s unfortunate instructions. 😊 I’m sitting here trying to recall if I ever had the X-ray for TB. I don’t recall it, but probably did. You are just a few years older than me, so I probably had it when a kid but just don’t recall it. I do remember getting the shot for smallpox which left a scar on the arm. Did you get that?
ReplyDeleteI don't think all jurisdictions had a testing regime. As teachers they were very vigilant with us and we were tested long after they ceased testing others.
DeleteI lived in Michigan for many years. They had a huge polio outbreak in the forties. I was there in the 90s and they were hit very hard by post-polio syndrome. All those people who had survived polio the first time were now elderly people getting hit by polio complications all over again.
ReplyDeletePolio was another nasty disease that had to be carefully monitored and people had to stay away from it.
DeleteI do remember TB being a big concern when I was younger. I really don't remember how and when I got tested though I'm sure I did. More recently I experienced TB through the experiences of some people I know in Africa. The family wasn't aware of the dangers of TB but once I told them they were able to get the patient in hospital and have family consults with a doctor to know how to manage everything.
ReplyDeleteMany underdeveloped countries struggle with TB.
DeleteMost US teachers and nurses are required to get tested for TB yearly or every other year. It's just a whelt created under your skin on a forearm. If a rash is created 3 days later, the test is repeated on the other arm. If positive, xrays are taken and medications given over several months. When I was an RN in Missouri, I learned at the KCVA that those with TB and were non-compliant with their oral medications, could be arrested and held at a hospital until their meds were done.
ReplyDeleteIn the early 1930s, my Mom's mother caught TB in rural Oklahoma and was shipped to a TB asylum to live out her days. My Mom told the story when she was 10-12 years old of visiting her mother by standing on the lawn of the asylum and looking up to her mom in the window. She died when my mom was 12 years old. It was such a sad time for so many families. Subsequently, my two brothers and I always reported to our Mom when we tested negative for our TB tests provided by our respective schools and jobs. Linda in Kansas
Here, testing of teachers ceased many years ago. In my early years of teaching we had to get tested each year. There were many very sad losses from TB. Your family had a very sad story'
DeleteMy grandmother died when my dad was five. She had TB and got pregnant...so they decided that she wouldn't survive the pregnancy so terminated it. Without antibiotics she didn't survive that either. That was in 1935....and in 1951 her father in law, my great grandfather, also died of TB...
ReplyDeleteIn some areas housing was poor and a good place for TB to live.
DeleteI'm told that TB was bad here in the years before I was born. There was a specialist hospital built at nearby Papworth to house the TB patients. In later years it became famous as the hospital where heart transplants were carried out.
ReplyDeleteGrandmother died at Chalk Farm...not sure where that is
DeleteInstitutions for treating TB were usually called sanitariums.
DeleteWhat an interesting look into our history. I was unaware of the TB X-ray campaign. I can imagine how terrifying that was to a kid knowing he could be taken away from his family. Sadly there is still some TB floating around in places I have been like the Philippines. But with modern medicine, it isn't a death sentence anymore.
ReplyDeleteHere, it still shows up in aboriginal communities.
DeleteHello,
ReplyDeleteI have heard there are cases of various diseases popping back up once again. Do the vaccines we have had as children last as long as we are living? Should we be re-vaccinated? Take care, have a great new week!
I've read that the main problem is that parents are not getting their children immunized.
DeleteAs a teacher, I was required to take the patch test until late 81 or early 82, I think it was. I always tested positive and was supposed to follow up with an X-ray. That time, I quietly decided not to, for I knew that my test was always positive and that I didn’t have TB. Nobody was any the wiser about my failure to comply, and I think that was the last time that the patch test was administered.
ReplyDeleteMuch later in life, I discovered that there was a group of people who were given a ‘live’ injection and they forever would test positive. (I am not sure if my ‘live’ description is correct but it contains the idea. My mother also tested positive, so I guess we got the same batch.)
They were very rigid about us being tested for TB. I don't remember when they stopped testing.
DeleteTB was mostly forgotten by the time i came into the world but my great grandfather died of it so I'm aware that it changed the life of my family.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure my parents were X rayed.
Don't fart would have been very unexpected advice 😊
I'm surprised that so many of my followers were very aware of TB.
DeleteTB devastated my grandfather’s family, both parents and all but three children in a large family died from it. My grandfather was one of them. Lucky for me!
ReplyDeleteMuch more recently, a family member working in a day care in Toronto was exposed to TB and was treated as a precaution. No more sanitariums thankfully!
Poor housing was one of the things that caused TB. In the Arctic the aboriginals were heavy smokers so that was a common cause.
DeleteI do remember when it was a scourge, but it seemed to go away and I never heard of anyone getting it as I was growing up.
ReplyDeleteIt was beginning to be controlled by the time we came along. I would think that your dad being in the forces was closely monitored.
DeleteNot a disease you want to take lightly.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely. It was dangerous.
DeleteI had forgotten about TB. It's not something that makes the headlines anymore. It's good to be reminded of times when it was a scourge.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure many of the younger people have never heard of it.
DeleteThe large hospital in my city began as a TB sanitarium in 1907. Naperville was a small country town then and people from Chicago were sent out there to recover.
ReplyDeletePeople were put on bed rest and in many cases not even allowed to get out of bed.
DeleteI remember standing on line in school for a TB SHOT... this was on Jersey in the English Channel... Evidently it was a prime spot for TB.... 1951
ReplyDeleteIt was a very strict regime followed to sht down TB. Just imagine how this would play out today where there are so many anti vaxxers.
DeleteVery serious medical issue and I'm thankful no one in my family ever had it.
ReplyDeleteHousing and cleanliness were big factor in the spread. In the Arctic the aboriginals were very heavy smokers.
DeleteI remember getting tested for TB in elementary school. The test left a circle of little prick marks on the inside of your lower arm and they checked those in a certain amount of time to see if you were positive or not.
ReplyDeleteI can't remember when they stopped those tests.
DeleteI remember getting the TB vaccination. I still have a faint scar.
ReplyDeleteI can't remember when they stopped this regime. I retired in 1997 but it was stopped long before that.
DeleteI had forgotten about TB, as well. I had to take a blood test for it prior to becoming a teacher.
ReplyDeleteWe had to take a test every year but I can't remember when it stopped.
DeleteI can't remember if I had those TB scans but I must have since we are of a similar age and came from a similar environment. That was a funny practical joke the Cree speaker played on the xray tech.
ReplyDeleteWhat a purely wonderful story. We still have TB some here in the United States and it is hard to eradicate because the people with it now usually have it more than one time because they cannot afford the medication, don't stay on the medication long enough or just refuse to take it at all. Did you know that Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs, Colorado began their lives as cities known for the TB hospitals in the mountains where the patients rested most of the day covered up in blankets on porches so that they would have as many hours per day of fresh mountain air as possible.
ReplyDeleteThere is not a vaccination that is approved in the United States. We got a tine test...a series of scratches on your arm, if you got a rash then you had to go have an xray and see your Doctor. My husbands Grandmother had TB, she was in a Sanitorium for years, she lost her hearing to TB and almost died. My husband says there were huge windows and he could see his Grandmother through the window at visiting time.
ReplyDeleteWe did/do still have to get a TB test before working in schools or places where you would be in contact with a lot of people. I'm glad it's not a huge worry anymore.
ReplyDelete