Somalis arrive in Emporia with tuberculosis

That’s the headline on an article today in the Topeka Capital-Journal. It begins:

EMPORIA — When hundreds of Somali refugees began showing up to work at the meatpacking plant, nurses Lori Torres and Renee Hively were among the first to get to know the exotic, new arrivals.

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“We got notified a day in advance that 70 Somalis were being transferred from a (Tyson Foods) plant in Nebraska,” Hively recalled. “That 70 soon grew into 400, seemingly overnight.”

“We literally had droves in our waiting room, waiting to see a public health official,” Torres said.

About 160 of the Somalis in Emporia have been diagnosed with latent TB. Latent TB is not contagious, but if it is not treated, 10 to 15 percent of the cases become active. So the health officials acted promptly to screen the new arrivals and to begin treating those with the disease. Good for them, but think of the resources needed to deal with this. Nurse Lori Torres now works full time just on TB cases.

Then there’s this, halfway down the article:

Most of the Somalis are young men who have spent most or all of their lives in refugee camps. Most have little or no formal education, and many arrived malnourished or with other health problems….Torres had done an extraordinary job gaining the trust of the Somalis, whose culture is conservative, Muslim and patriarchal.

Why are most of the Somalis young men? Where are the women and children?

And does any American refugee official think that bringing in young single Muslim men might be a problem? It’s not as if Somali men have been shy about trying to impose their religious laws on Americans. Remember the Minneapolis taxi drivers who refused to pick up passengers carrying alcohol in their luggage? They were Somalis. (More on the taxi drivers controversy here and here.) And the fun has only just begun for Emporia:

The total Somali population in Emporia is thought to be between 750 and 1,000, and the expectation is that the number will continue to grow as word of jobs spreads to Somali enclaves in Utah, Minnesota, Maine and Ohio.

Well, at least Tyson Foods will get its cheap labor, whatever the cost to Emporians.

Listen to interview about the Emporia TB issue on Kansas Public Radio here.

(See other posts on TB and other health issues here.)