Denver Health Official Proposes Reinstating Some Mandatory TB Testing

Denver's public health chief wants to reinstate TB testing for food service workers born outside the United States as Colorado tries to reverse last year's spike in TB cases. Denver's environmental health board rescinded TB testing for food workers four years ago when about 35 percent of foreign-born employees tested positive, said Dr. Frank Judson, director of the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment.

"The board seemed to be responding entirely to the restaurant industry's desires to have less screening done of their employees," Judson said. "It was a bad idea." TB cases in Colorado rose 42 percent last year while falling nationwide. The Colorado Restaurant Association said Judson's idea is unfair because it focuses on food workers. "I might endorse it if it involved the entire public," said Peter Meersman, association president. "But what about taxi drivers? Do you just screen the foreign-born? Where do you draw the line?"

Colorado's chief medical officer, Ned Calonge, is also pushing for a law to give health officials more power to quarantine people with drug-resistant types of TB. Colorado law allows health officials to quarantine people with infectious diseases to hospitals, homes or motels. The proposed quarantine could be used for people with multi-drug-resistant TB who have ceased taking medicine, and could be issued even if the person is no longer contagious. Patients considered a flight risk could be incarcerated or monitored by police.

The proposal also calls on health officers to screen people at increased risk of TB, including natives of Asia or Latin America or people with HIV. Colorado's TB Elimination Advisory Committee has called for increased funding, screening and treatment of high-risk residents and an awareness campaign to help doctors respond to TB symptoms.

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