A multidrug-resistant tuberculosis known as MDR-TB is found in many immigrants

Jennifer Harper:

A multidrug-resistant tuberculosis known as MDR-TB is persistent in California, primarily among its "foreign-born" population, and has serious financial implications for the state's public-health system, federal and state health officials said yesterday.

"Treatment for MDR-TB is very expensive -- ranging from $200,000 to $1.2 million per person, over an 18- to 24-month time period," said Dr. Reuben Granich, a lead investigator for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, during a press conference in the District yesterday.

Dr. Granich's findings were published yesterday in tomorrow's issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) in an article co-written with California health officials.

The article studied 38,291 reported tuberculosis cases in California from 1994 to 2003. Of those, 407 were classified as drug-resistant and were found mostly in patients from Mexico or the Philippines, Dr. Granich said.

He added that 84 percent of patients infected with MDR-TB "were foreign born" and that those infected are four times as likely to die from the disease and twice as likely to "transmit the disease to others" than other tuberculosis patients.

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