 Text
from interview:
Deputy State Health Officer Dr. Joseph H. Bates
Click on topic for video text
Video Clip 1: Dr. Bates discusses the threat of TB
Video Clip 2: Dr. Bates discusses the Arkansas
Department of Health's TB Program
Video Clip 3: Dr. Bates discusses Arkansas' cutting edge
technology used for diagnostic testing related to TB
Video Clip 4: Dr. Bates discusses the importance of
World TB Day
Video Clip 5: Dr. Bates discusses treatment for TB
Why is tuberculosis still a global threat?
DR. BATES: Tuberculosis still is a very important
disease worldwide. It's the most common cause of death
from an infectious disease in the world. When one takes
into account death from malaria, HIV, diarrheal diseases,
pneumonias -- all of those combined are less than the deaths
from tuberculosis.
What's unique about the Tuberculosis Control Program at the Arkansas
Department of Health?
DR. BATES: The Tuberculosis Control Program in
Arkansas run by the Department of Health is perhaps one of the
best programs in the world. People come here from all
over the United States and all over the world really to see
how we've done it.
This department was the first to try placing patients with
tuberculosis in community hospitals. This was done in
the 60's. In the 70's, this department tried first the
so-called short course treatment, that is, getting drugs for a
very brief period of time to provide a cure and did that on an
outpatient basis. And now we are leaders in the study of
tuberculosis and how it spreads in communities and among
individuals.
What
technological advances in tuberculosis control have been made
in Arkansas?
DR. BATES: The Health Department Tuberculosis
Research laboratory, together with the laboratories that do
tuberculosis research at the VA Medical Center, have worked
together and have achieved some remarkable
advances.
In the 1990's, they developed a technique that would allow for
the rapid diagnosis of tuberculosis using DNA
technology. And they also developed a way to fingerprint
the tuberculosis germ using its DNA so that each tuberculosis
germ has a unique fingerprint, very much like each human has a
uniqueness. This allowed one to follow and track a
tuberculosis germ as it moves in a community or moves in an
outbreak of tuberculosis anyplace in the world.
What
is the significance of World TB Day?
DR. BATES: On March 24, we will celebrate and
recognize World Tuberculosis Day. We do this to bring to
the attention of everyone its importance. That
tuberculosis is still a global threat, that anyplace in the
world you must be aware and alert to the possibility of
tuberculosis and that drug-resistant tuberculosis is
especially a problem in many parts of the world, particularly
the Eastern European Countries and Russia.
People come to the United States in the millions each year and
frequently they bring tuberculosis with them. Forty
percent of the tuberculosis in the United States occurs among
the foreign born. So it's a global problem, we can't
build a fence around the United States, we have to think about
tuberculosis as a world problem that's important to everyone
in the United States.
Is tuberculosis treatable?
DR. BATES: The most exciting thing about
tuberculosis is that it's completely curable. And the
treatment is almost always given entirely as an
outpatient. The treatment is a matter of taking pills
for a few weeks or a few months and you can expect to have a
complete cure.
It's also a very preventable disease. If you have
certain tests done and we know that you're at risk of
developing tuberculosis at some time in the future, we have
methods now to treat you with pills and assure you that you
won't develop tuberculosis at some time in the future.
Using these two methods, we can essentially eradicate
tuberculosis from the United States. We hope to do that
maybe in the next 10 to 15 years.
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