‘It’s pretty contagious.’ Tuberculosis case confirmed at Chester High School, DHEC says
CHESTER COUNTY, S.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — Health officials in South Carolina have identified a lab-confirmed case of tuberculosis at Chester High School.
The Chester County School District says a letter was sent home to parents regarding the TB case.
The South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control says it’s working with school officials to investigate who had close contact with the infected person and those people will be tested.
“It’s (tuberculosis is) pretty contagious, so if you have been around someone with it, we recommend you do get tested even if you don’t have symptoms,” said Bailey Ward, a family nurse practitioner, with Carolina Medical Consultants of Piedmont Medical Center.
TB is a lung infection that’s spread through the air by a person who has the disease by coughing or sneezing. It can be treated with antibiotics.
Symptoms include shortness of breath, chest pain, a cough that lasts longer than three weeks, coughing up blood, and night sweats.
“It is treatable. If it goes untreated, you can have some pretty serious complications like blood clots in your lungs, lung cancer, and sometimes even death.,” said Ward.
DHEC says it’s looking at the school layout and the activities of the person who has tuberculosis to figure out the level of risk for classrooms, lunchrooms, and other areas where students and staff gather.
The agency says schoolwide testing is rare and that only people identified as a close contact with the person who has TB need to be tested.
There are two types of tests: a skin test and a blood test.
DHEC says the school itself is not a source of infection, so it is safe for students, staff, and visitors to be inside the school.
“If a parent does have concerns, I would definitely reach out to their child’s pediatrician and explain their symptoms or if they’ve been exposed and kind of go from there,” said Ward.
DHEC says parents will be contacted if their child may have been exposed to TB so that the students can be tested.
There is a vaccine for tuberculosis, but it’s not given in the United States, only in other countries, to babies and young children, where TB rates are higher.
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