A new report released by the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has placed Kenyans among immigrants from five countries prone to attack and spread of tuberculosis.
The other countries flagged besides Kenya include Ethiopia, Somalia, Liberia and Myanmar.
What this means is there will be more scrutiny for immigrants in the US or those planning to travel there if they are from the five countries flagged by CDC.
“The study was carried out to identify high-risk tuberculosis groups that might benefit most from prevention and enhanced surveillance,” the journal in Epidemics by CDC states.
In 16 years, a team from CDC and universities such as Yale University, Stanford University and Harvard University recorded 122,118 from their investigations stemming from about 100 countries.
The team found out that Kenya has the highest risk of infection followed by Somalia, Ethiopia, Myanmar and Liberia.
“In particular, more recent entrants from Kenya, Myanmar and Liberia are predicted to face greater TB risks than earlier entrants from these countries,” the report cites.
It was also discovered that the highest cases of TB were among immigrants from Mexico, India, China and Vietnam.
The CDC reports stated that aged immigrants were particularly at a high risk because the TB bacteria stays in their body for many years and only shows later when it is full blown which is what has led to many cases in the recent past.
This delayed progression of the bacteria is known as reactivation.
Besides the US recording a growing number of TB cases, other countries such as Canada, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand and Ireland have also recorded an increasing number of tuberculosis cases from this demographic.
A separate study by the UK on tuberculosis infection and spread found that immigrants from Somalia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Kenya had the highest rates of getting infected.
