Chicago Public Health Spox: Don’t Worry about TB Cases in Migrant Shelters

Shelters housing illegal aliens in Chicago are experiencing outbreaks of measles. Now reports are popping up that tuberculosis cases are being detected in city shelters. 

The Chicago Department of Public Health confirmed this troubling news but could not say how many cases were discovered or identify the shelters. The department did say there have not been reports of TB in the city from exposure to illegal aliens who have tested positive for the infection. 

The ‘newcomers’ are bringing in preventable diseases as they invade the United States. (Newcomers is the word the Biden administration wants to use for illegal border crossers.) I’m old enough to remember when Donald Trump ran for president in 2015 with illegal immigration as a major focus of his campaign. Democrats and their fellow open border travelers took to their fainting couches when Trump dared to say that illegal immigrants can bring disease with them. 

Jacob Martin, a spokesman for the health department in Chicago said that TB cases show up in Chicago every year. There are about 100-150 infections detected annually. He says that the health department needs to organize its data to determine cases from new arrivals and those of other city residents. He said the numbers will be made public once the analysis is done.

No biggie. That seems to be the message. Sanctuary cities are still trying to normalize an invasion by illegal aliens in the United States. None of this is normal. Just because a large city like Chicago that attracts illegal aliens with or without a border crisis has cases of TB in any year doesn’t mean that more cases coming in is nothing to be concerned about. “I would not characterize this as an outbreak. It’s relatively in line with what we expect to see.” Nothing to see here, just move along.

The TB cases are different than the recent measles outbreak seen in Chicago. Dr. Emily Landon, an infectious disease doctor, reminded those who are concerned about TB that it is curable with antibiotics. It is not as easy to contact as some may think because it usually requires hours of contact between people. A person can be infected with TB but the disease may remain dormant for years. It can be compared to chickenpox and how that disease can linger in a body for years and then become shingles.  

About 10% to 20% of Central and South American residents have latent TB infections, Martin said, meaning they’re positive for the infection but are asymptomatic and can’t pass it to others. But he said the health department is still working out which of the recent cases are latent and which are active infections.

When migrants receive care from Cook County Health, they’re screened for TB, among other illnesses, Martin said. The department also prioritizes getting people vaccinated against a range of communicable diseases.

“We are literally always pushing to get more people vaccinated. With these vaccine-preventable diseases, we can prevent their spread with vaccines,” Martin said.

The department has administered about 6,000 MMR vaccines to illegal aliens. Other vaccines include COVID-19, flu, and chickenpox. 

 If a person is discovered to have an active TB infection, the health department assigns nurse case managers to each person and conducts contact tracing.

There is worry about children ages 5 and younger contracting TB. One reason is that children in Venezuela, for example, are only partially vaccinated or not vaccinated at all. Venezuela’s vaccination rate is among the lowest in the world. Venezuelans make up a large portion of illegal immigrants crossing the border. President Biden has given them special status in the parole program administered by DHS. Venezuelan children lack several of the recommended vaccines by age 12 months. They are often not protected against polio, measles, and TB. 

For the first time since 2019, measles has been detected in Chicago. At least 52 cases have been confirmed in Chicago. Most of the cases are from an early March outbreak at a migrant shelter in Pilsen.

Nonetheless, the insistence on normalizing illegal immigration continues. 

“We don’t need to be afraid from an infectious diseases standpoint; the city’s doing a great job of managing the infection risk,” Landon said. “And all the doctors in the city, especially the infectious disease specialists, are working hard to have great pathways for new arrivals that bring in diseases that we already know about.”

These cases and other outbreaks are not a reason to be afraid of migrants, she added. Rather, it demonstrates the health risks they might face coming to the city.

The flood of newcomers is not ending anytime soo. Trump was right about the crime being brought by many of the illegal aliens and the same is true about diseases now surfacing in communities. Chicago won’t be the only city that will have to handle outbreaks. Biden’s open border is a public health risk, as well as a national security risk and a humanitarian crisis. The only way to shut it down is to elect a president in November who is committed to securing the border.