An outbreak of tuberculosis in the Kansas City area has grown into one of the largest ever recorded in the United States, with dozens of active cases of the infectious disease reported, according to health officials.
As of Jan. 24, 67 active cases of tuberculosis, or TB, had been reported in Wyandotte and Johnson counties in Kansas.
The outbreak began last year, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment said on its website. It did not specify a source of the outbreak.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment is monitoring 384 people for TB exposure and helping with testing and treatment, a spokesperson said in a statement.
“While this outbreak is larger than normal, the risk remains low for the general public,” the spokesperson said.
Tuberculosis, which spreads through the air, is caused by a bacterium that typically affects the lungs, but can also impact other parts of the body, such as the brain, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If not treated, it can be fatal.
People can become infected with tuberculosis germs that can live in the body for years without causing symptoms, called inactive, or latent, TB. Without receiving treatment, those people can develop active tuberculosis at any time.
Analyzing the risks of tuberculosis
Since 2024, 79 latent infections have been reported in the Kansas City, Kansas, area, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
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Four staff from the CDC are on site providing assistance with contact tracing, testing and screening and working with community leaders on health education, an agency spokesperson said.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The U.S. recorded 8,649 cases of tuberculosis last year, and 9,606 in 2023, according to the CDC.
Tuberculosis replaced COVID-19 as the top cause for infectious disease-related deaths in 2023, according to a World Health Organization report published in October, highlighting challenges in the global effort in eradicating the disease.
While anyone can contract tuberculosis, it is most commonly found in people who live or used to live in large group settings or those who frequently travel to countries where tuberculosis is common.
The largest tuberculosis outbreak in the U.S. occurred from 2015 through 2017 at a homeless shelter in Georgia, which was responsible for more than 170 active cases and more than 400 latent cases, according to the CDC, which began tracking TB cases in the 1950s.
