OAN Staff Abril Elfi
3:03 PM – Tuesday, January 28, 2025
U.S. health officials in Kansas and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that Kansas is now facing the “largest tuberculosis (TB) outbreak in United States history.”
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The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) announced that, as of January 24th, there have been at least 60 confirmed cases of active tuberculosis in Wyandotte County, and seven in Johnson County.
Additionally, there are 77 confirmed latent TB cases in Wyandotte County and two in Johnson County.
KDHE continued, explaining that cases linked to the outbreak were first reported in January 2024, and so far, there have been two deaths related to the outbreak — both of which occurred last year.
“The current Kansas City, Kan. Metro tuberculosis (TB) outbreak is the largest documented outbreak in U.S. history, presently (since the 1950s, when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) started monitoring and reporting TB cases),” KDHE said in a statement. “This outbreak is still ongoing, which means that there could be more cases.”
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) spokesperson noted that a 2015-2017 outbreak response recorded more than 170 cases of TB and over 400 cases of inactive TB, while a 2021 outbreak linked to a contaminated bone graft product infected 113 people.
Health officials believe that risk to the general public and residents of nearby counties is “very low,” and the department is acting in accordance with the CDC’s recommendations.
The CDC reminded concerned Kansans that Mycobacterium tuberculosis is the type of bacteria that causes tuberculosis. According to the government health agency, it is one of the most common infectious illness killers worldwide.
TB is transmitted from person to person through the air. Germs are released into the air when a person with tuberculosis coughs, talks, or sings. Additionally, these germs can remain in the air for several hours before infecting someone else.
Symptoms of TB include: a cough that lasts for three weeks or longer, coughing up blood or phlegm, chest pain, weakness, fatigue, weight loss, loss of appetite, fever, chills and night sweats.
Latent or Inactive TB is also possible, which is when people become infected with TB germs that live in the body for years without causing illness. Those with inactive TB cannot spread it to other people. However, if untreated, they can still later develop active TB.
Last year, the U.S. saw over 8,700 cases of TB, according to CDC data.
There are several treatment regimens for TB that may last anywhere from four months to nine months, depending on the course of treatment.
A vaccine known as Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) is given to children in countries where TB is common. However, it is generally not recommended in the U.S. — due to the low risk of infection with the bacteria, variable vaccine effectiveness among adults, and the vaccine’s potential interference with TB tests.
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