Poor ventilation in schools may spur TB spread
Adding windows that open may improve students' health
By Nathan Seppa
Poor ventilation in classrooms might contribute to tuberculosis spread among children, researchers in South Africa find. By asking students to wear air monitors, the scientists showed that the average student was breathing an unsafe level of others’ exhaled air three-fifths of the time.
Cape Town has a high rate of TB, which is spread when the mycobacterium goes airborne. High school students in Cape Town test positive for TB at a rate of more than 4 per 1,000. Since TB carriers in the early stages of infection often lack symptoms beyond a cough, school transmission is likely, says study coauthor Linda-Gail Bekker, a physician and scientist at the University of Cape Town.