Immigration Reform and Disease

Immigration Reform and the Control and Spread of Disease

Though we're not experts on either subject, some of us tend to be a little fearful of the potential for the spread of new untreatable disease. For example, see the story: Up to 30,000 have new untreatable form of TB: WHO.

Is this a real concern? For example (see the photo), some of the nice folks here are probably illegals and probably without disease. (We found it amusing and bemusing that at least one of them was carrying the image of Che Guevara - the late Marxist revolutionary from Cuba - representing another potential threat to America). But, we're talking about 12 million illegal immigrants in the US. And, that number could potentially grow to 112 million illegals. That makes the odds pretty good for disease carrying individuals to start showing up with incurable/drug-resistant tuberculosis and other plagues and scourges. Look at the recent case with the flying attorney who supposedly made unauthorized travel while carrying the drug-resistant tuberculosis bacterium.

No, we're not in the business of fear-mongering. But, we are in fear of this new scourge. Most of us have children. Almost all of us have parents. Think of your child or your aging mother coughing up blood one night - and later hearing of them diagnosed with this dreadful disease. Could this happen with lax and lazy immigration reform? We think it really could happen - and should be avoided at all costs. Should we reconsider the Immigration Reform Act of 1917 as a measure/means of disease control and protecting our loved ones, our population and our nation? We think we should.

Also, we're not in the business of closing our doors to all immigrants. Just the illegal ones. How does the new reform bill fairly take into account all of these options?

Well, let's look at some numbers. If 30,000 people (that's per year) take sick with DR (Drug Resistant) TB (tuberculosis), and just one of them happens to visit one of 125 cities in America with a population of over 100,000 - then that's only a less than one percent chance (0.80%) that could potentially infect a population of that size.

Wait, let's rethink that. Of the current 12 million illegals in the US, 1 in 3 could have the DR. Some calculations on our Excel spreadsheet suggest that raises the odds to potential infection in a major population to just over 106%. Which means that the bug is probably here already - in a major population center in the US - or it will be coming soon. But of course, it is here, just look at the flying attorney story. And he's not exactly illegal immigrant - or is he?

And, is quarantine by the CDC constitutional for this gentleman with the DRTB? Probably not, which is why we really need to consider DRTB and other diseases in the new immigration reform.