Twenty-six babies in Taiwan are receiving preventive medication following exposure to a staff member at a post-partum care center who in April was diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB), the New Taipei City Department of Health said yesterday.
The department was not notified about the situation until May, when it immediately sent health inspectors to the center in Sijhih District (汐止) to assess the situation, it said.
The staff member is a nurse who had been employed at the facility for about six months and had taken care of 26 newborns during that time, the department said.
The nurse, a Keelung resident who had been commuting to Sijhih, was diagnosed with tuberculosis in April and she quit her job at the center that month, the department said.
When it was notified of the case in May, it did not inform the mothers of the 26 babies, because it did not want them to risk going to a hospital for tuberculosis tests at the height of a domestic COVID-19 outbreak, the department said.
A person who has been exposed to tuberculosis bacteria cannot spread the disease to others right away, which makes it difficult to quickly diagnose, the department said.
The 26 infants with whom the infected nurse had contact have undergone chest X-rays and are being given preventive medication for nine months, it said, adding that they will be X-rayed again after 12 months.
The matter came to light this week after members of the Xizhi Group Facebook page said that they had only been notified this month that their babies had been exposed to a person with tuberculosis.
The disease is a potentially fatal chronic respiratory condition caused by bacteria, but it cannot be transmitted by surface contact with items such as clothing and eating utensils, the department said.
It spreads after prolonged exposure to someone with the disease, it said.
Common symptoms include chest pain, weight loss, poor appetite, fatigue, fever and a persistent cough that might produce blood, it said.
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