Thanks to Private Donations from the International Community Foundation, Neumologists in Tijuana and San Diego Team up to Fight Tuberculosis [2]
According to Fronteras: The Changing American Desk, Tijuana has the most success [3] in the treatment of drug-resistant tuberculosis in Mexico, seeing an average of 700 new cases a year.
“When you visit this clinic, I can tell you if you have tuberculosis within three weeks,” said Dr. Rafael Laniado, the chief neumologist at the Tijuana tuberculosis clinic.
This is remarkable for Mexico [4], where typical tuberculosis testing means waiting more than three months to get a diagnosis and having to send samples to Mexico City or to a laboratory in the United States. Tijuana’s [5] state-of-the-art laboratory opened in 2006, with funding from the Mexican government as well as $400,000 from USAID [6] for construction and testing equipment.
Tijuana is in a unique position to treat and prevent the spread of this infectious disease. About 90 percent of people seen at this laboratory go on to keep their tuberculosis under control. But those who fail to get treatment typically go on to infect 10 to 15 others.
At a recent public-health conference in San Diego, the lessons and challenges of Tijuana’s laboratory took center stage. Steve Waterman was there on behalf of the Centers for Disease Control. [7]
“Tuberculosis rates in the U.S. are really at an all-time low. But parts of the country like California and San Diego – where there’s a high number of foreign-born persons – have higher rates than the rest of the country,” said Steve Waterman, an expert on infectious diseases across borders in the Fronteras: The Changing American Desk article. “I think the Tijuana-San Diego partnership is a very focused collaboration and it’s addressing a very important need.”
Dr. Laniado isn’t the only neumologist working on diagnosis of his patients, other doctors in the United States collarborate on diagnosis. One of the reasons this collaboration works is the binational [8] sharing of resources, medical training, and common goals. At a time when budget cuts are the reality and public health programs are hurting in both countries, the Tijuana-San Diego area has been able to raise money from foundations and groups, like Rotary International, to make up for the shortfall.
This summer, the San Diego-based International Community Foundation [9] will step in as well, donating more than $30,000 to tuberculosis laboratories in Tijuana and Mexicali to pay for testing-equipment maintenance and personnel.