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Show Utah TB Association To Join Plan to Beat Tuberculosis The endorsement of a recent nation-wide plan to eliminate tuberculosis in this country was jointly announced Wednesday by the Utah State Health Department Depart-ment and the Utah Tuberculosis and Health Association. Announcing the endorsement were the heads of the two agencies, agen-cies, Dr. George W. Soffe of Salt Lake City and John H. Zenger of Provo. They called for the support of the people of Utah in order that tuberculosis might be brought under control. The tuberculosis eradication plan, launched nationally last March, was the result of a top level conference of scientists sponsored byt he National Tuberculosis Tu-berculosis Association and the U. S. Public Health Service. Known as the . Arden House Conference, it resulted in 13 recommendations which the scientists sci-entists said would bring about the elimination of tuberculosis. The most inspiring conclusion arrived at by the Arden House conferees was that the goal can be reached, if this nation wants to reach it. If bold and decisive action is taken tuberculosis can be virtually wiped out in this country. The tuberculosis control plans will be described Friday morning morn-ing at the annual meeting of the Utah Tuberculosis and Health Association at Hotel Utah. Dr. Julius L. Wilson, a consultant to the Arden House Conference, will be guest speaker. First on the list of recommendations recommen-dations for the national control plan is the widespread use of drug treatment as public health measure. Recent development of antituberculosis anti-tuberculosis drugs have made possible the control of the tuberculosis tuber-culosis germs in patients. While oresent day drugs do not cure the patient of his disease, they do render the patient non-infectious in a comparatively short time. That is, the patient on drug treatment is no longer capable cap-able of spreading TB to others. ! Putting greater emphasis on the early detection of unknown TB cases and then being sure that the person is on adequate drug treatment for the length of time necessary, will remove the reservoir of tubercle bacilli that presently exists. Eventually a state of control will be reached, as we now find it in typhoid ; fever. The Arden House conference emphasized that now is the time for a big push on TB. Because of the way in which certain disease causing bacteria become resistant resist-ant to drugs, it means that if there is a delay the opportunity for control may have passed. Other recommendations include in-clude an evaluation of detection programs, investigating deaths from unreported tuberculosis; reviewing reporting practices; providing laboratory services necessary in the modern TB control con-trol program. |