From cash strapped
California
Public care for Ukiah and Fort Bragg patients diagnosed with latent tuberculosis narrowly escaped cancellation during the Tuesday Mendocino County Board of Supervisors meeting -- at least until July.
Its not the first time Californian TB clinics have
faced the axe
Federal grants for TB programs have declined in the last two years, and the TB section lost six employees in the current funding year, said Dr. L. Masae Kawamura, director of San Francisco's TB Control Section. The new year is expected to bring additional budget cuts at the local, state, and national levels.
"If we have five multidrug-resistant [MDR TB] cases in San Francisco this coming year, we're not going to have enough funding to manage them," said Kawamura. "We've already changed our operations to be lean, mean, and efficient, but there's a point where you've done everything you can, and that's where we are now."
Areas in Arizona are also
feeling the pinch
Annual state funding to the county's TB program dropped from $167,000 in 2008 to $76,000 last year, county clinic manager Anne Davis said. The county's TB program is funded by a blend of county, state and federal funds.
