A woman in the state of Washington, United States (US) is threatened with imprisonment because of her illness. The reason is, he has tuberculosis or tuberculosis but is not treated and walks freely everywhere.
This action is considered harmful to others because it can transmit the disease. The woman, who wished to remain anonymous, was monitored via electronic home monitoring so authorities learned she had violated several court orders to have her active and infectious tuberculosis case treated and remained in isolation while doing so.
Last week, the Tacoma-Pierce, Washington, County Health Department announced that it was monitoring a case of active tuberculosis in a woman who refused treatment in the area.
"Most of the people we contact are happy to get the care they need," said Nigel Turner, director of the Infectious Disease Control division, quoted from ArsTechnica, Wednesday (8/2/2023).
"But sometimes people resist treatment and isolation. When that happens, we take steps to help keep the community safe."
According to a report by The News Tribune, the woman's refusal to heed public health guidelines is apparently an old case for local officials. The document filed with Pierce County Superior Court states that the first court order issued for the woman to be forced into isolation was executed just over a year ago to January 19, 2022.
Deadly threat
Tuberculosis is a bacterial infection caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis and mostly causes disease in the lungs, although it can attack other parts of the body.
This disease can easily turn deadly if you don't get the right treatment. M. tuberculosis is transmitted through the air when an infected person coughs, sneezes, spits, or expels the surrounding bacterial cells.
Although transmission occurs mostly through close and prolonged contact, just inhaling some of these microscopic germs is enough to trigger an infection. According to the World Health Organization, tuberculosis is one of the top killer infectious diseases in the world. This disease will cause 1.6 million deaths in 2021.
Treatment of tuberculosis is not easy, it takes four or six months and four types of antibiotics to get rid of the infection effectively. But M. tuberculosis is becoming increasingly drug-resistant, even extensively drug-resistant (XDR-TB). This is considered to be causing a global public health crisis and a threat to health security.
These drug-resistant cases can take up to 20 months of antibiotic therapy in combination with expensive and toxic alternative treatments. But drug resistance develops or increases if patients fail to complete or take their prescribed antibiotics correctly, as happened with the Washington woman.
January 2022 court documents record that local health officials ordered the woman to self-isolate and undergo treatment, but she refused.
The court issued an order for forced isolation, but nothing. The woman continues to refuse to be quarantined, according to the order issued on January 26, 2022. The order was renewed on February 14, 2022, then February 24, March 24, April 19, and so on every month until December 16, 2022.
Peak point
Last month, the Ministry of Health appeared to have reached a breaking point. Not only is the woman approaching the one-year mark for violating a court order, but she has also been in a car accident, which seems to highlight her negligence.
According to additional court documents filed by the Ministry of Health on January 11, the woman was involved in a car accident as a passenger. This means that he is not isolated at home where he is supposed to be and is in close contact with the driver so he is at risk of contracting tuberculosis.
In addition, he went to the emergency room the day after the accident complaining of chest pains and did not tell his treating doctor about his active tuberculosis case, putting other doctors and hospital staff at risk.
When the medical team took an X-ray of his chest and saw the condition of his lungs, they initially suspected he had cancer. But in fact, the X-rays revealed that his TB case was getting worse.
Even worse, he also tested positive for COVID-19, thus further emphasizing that he was not self-isolating according to this court order.
The court renewed its order on January 20, 2023, adding that failure to comply with regulations this time could result in the Court ordering further action, including placing under electronic surveillance.
According to the most recent data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 7,882 cases of tuberculosis in the US in 2021 and 600 tuberculosis-related deaths in 2020. The Tacoma-Pierce Department of Health reports that Washington state averages about 200 cases per year, and Pierce County, south of Seattle, averages about 20 cases.
