Calls to give TB vaccination to Cork school junior infants

PUBLIC health officials dealing with an outbreak of tuberculosis which has infected 25 children at a Cork school have requested that junior infants due to start school next week be prioritised for vaccination.

Dr Margaret O’Sullivan, public health consultant with the Health Service Executive (HSE) South, said they had asked the BCG vaccination department to put these children at the top of a list of 4,400 children waiting to be inoculated against the disease.

Since the first child case of TB was notified to public health officials on July 29, 25 children at Ballintemple National School, Crab Lane, have been diagnosed with the disease, including five with full-blown TB and 20 with a non-infectious latent form.