The possible spread of tuberculosis at Lafayette High School has warranted an investigation by the Louisiana Office of Public Health.
The issue was brought to the attention of Lafayette Parish School System officials Tuesday afternoon by the Office of Public Health, says Angela Morrison, director of community collaborations and partnerships for LPSS. The school system responded by sending a mass email Tuesday evening to the parents of LHS students.
“They contacted us saying they would be investigating a case that may be,” says Morrison. “That’s why parents, faculty and staff all were notified of the need for testing.”
The testing will be conducted Monday and Tuesday by Public Health officials, and will only include those who are considered at-risk for infection.
“Tuberculosis is a lung infection caused by a bacteria,” says Dr. Tina Stefanski, medical director for the Acadiana region of the OPH. “It spreads through the air by close, prolonged contact to an infected person.”
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| Dr. Tina Stefanski |
Stefanski tells IND Monthly that the “possible” infection at Lafayette High has yet to be confirmed.
“It may take several weeks before we get the results back on the suspected case,” says Stefanski. “We do not wait on those results to proceed with our investigation. We are currently identifying those people considered most at-risk and who were in closest contact with the suspected case. They will undergo blood-testing, and we should get those results back in a couple of days.”
Stefanski says it remains unclear how many people will undergo next week's testing. She says she will know more by Monday.
According to Tuesday’s e-mail, a letter, which must be signed and returned by Friday, will be distributed today to parents of at-risk students:
If your child does not receive a letter, Office of Public Health believes your child is not at a high risk of exposure to this suspected case. Therefore, it is not necessary to test your child at this time.
For more information, Stefanski says people can call her office at 262-5311.
MAY 24 Blogger Robert Mann posts this entry about the Baton Rouge Chamber's recent report on Louisiana's higher education system. It's critical to economic development, and yet our system is facing a "funding crisis" with no way to resolve it, the report says. The Chamber says control of tuition and fees must be returned to the higher ed governing boards.
MAY 24 Here's a NBC33 story about Tyrann Mathieu. He has signed with the Arizona Cardinals, inking a $3 million, four-year deal. He gets a signing bonus of $265K, but gets another, larger bonus if he doesn't get cut from the team for doing drugs. The deal reportedly includes mandatory tests and meetings for the player.
MAY 24 Jarvis DeBerry posts here about the redonkulus rhetoric that would have us believe NOLA is a safe city with a murder problem. Maybe the city's crime stats don't compare with its murder stats because you can't manipulate a murder, he says: a dead body's a dead body. It just doesn't make sense, he says, and his readers agree: a poll asks if they believe the city is safe, and more than 90 percent say no.
MAY 24 Jindal administration officials announced Thursday that the privatization of public health care is going to cost a lot more than they budgeted for, the Advocate reports here. "I'm so surprised," said no one. Anywhere. The cost they're projecting now is more than $1 billion - a lot more than the $626 million budgeted for it. And, it's more than it cost the state to operate those hospitals. So why are we doing this again?
MAY 24 Blogger CB Forgotston ridicules the recent PR campaign by the state GOP in the wake of a legislative auditor's request to both major parties. The GOP (apparently unaware that the Dems got the same request) started yammering about being targeted because it had "killed" a tax increase. CB finds that laughable, but it's also pretty funny that the GOP was comparing this episode to the IRS scandal (Because the President has so much to do with our state auditor. Right?).
MAY 24 Politico details some recent fund-raising efforts by Sen. David Vitter, which have raised the question of his future political plans. This time, it is a $5,000 per head "bayou weekend" that includes "Cajun cooking" and an all-caps "alligator hunt," the story reports. Funds raised go to a super PAC that can spend money to support Vitter in federal or state races, the story points out.
MAY 24 The pink building on Royal in the quarter was sold at a sheriff's sale Thursday, this Picayune story reports. An injunction that would have halted the sale wasn't enforced because the family failed to post a $150,000 bond, the story reports. So the owner of the mortgages on the building bought it, for nearly $7 million. Now the feuding family will have to negotiate with that company to get a lease on the building that has housed their business for close to 60 years.
MAY 23 This post in Louisiana Voice tells us about a bill by a Winnsboro lege that would require all public high school students to take at least one Course Choice online class in order to graduate. (What?) Blogger Tom Aswell says it's a monument to "waste and corruption," especially in light of the problems he's exposed with the program in recent weeks. Idaho had a similar program, but voters removed it by a 2-1 margin, Aswell says.
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