From the Frontera NorteSur news service (story not online):

Mexican health authorities plan to kick off an intensive tuberculosis detection campaign October 23 at public clinics in Ciudad Juarez. The project follows an increase in the number of TB cases registered in the border city during the last two years. According to statistics compiled by the state Health District #2, local TB cases jumped from 188 in 2006 to 243 in 2007. In 2008, 180 cases have been detected in Ciudad Juarez so far.
“There is a lot of lack of knowledge among the population about the disease, and that’s why people are invited to inform themselves,” said Dr. Luis Mauricio Acosta Castro, tuberculosis program coordinator for Health District #2. “(Tuberculosis) continues existing in Ciudad Juarez and it has become a serious public health problem.”
Dr. Acosta stressed that anyone can become infected with tuberculosis, but children, pregnant women, drug users, diabetics, and the elderly are most at risk of contracting the contagious disease. “We are seeing that TB is beginning to be associated with diabetes,” he added.
Health officials in neighboring El Paso, Texas, are aware of the tuberculosis problem in Ciudad Juarez and work with Mexican health care providers to stem the spread of the disease.
Esteban Vlasich, binational tuberculosis program director for the Texas Department of Health, said information on Ciudad Juarez tuberculosis patients is forwarded to state labs in Austin which then pass on the names of drug-resistant patients to US immigration authorities. According to Vlasich, eight individuals are currently banned from entering the United States because of their TB status.
“If these people try to enter the US, they are denied permission at the international crossings,” Vlasich said. However, the US official acknowledged that detecting contagious persons who hold temporary border crossing cards was more difficult. [MK: Half of all entries to the U.S. by foreigners are on Mexican Border Crossing Cards.] Vlasich said the number of TB drug-resistant cases in Ciudad Juarez increased from four in 2008 to eight in 2008.
According to Dr. Acosta, between 78 to 80 percent of Ciudad Juarez TB patients are cured after undergoing drug treatment. The Mexican specialist attributed the relatively high rate of uncured cases on patients prematurely abandoning drug treatment, a practice which increases drug resistance and the possibilities for contagion.