By james art BATON ROUGE — Louisiana authorities want federal immigration officials to prevent the release of any inmates in Basil and Monroe who may have been exposed to a rare form of tuberculosis carried by a Chinese woman who was admitted to the detention centers this summer.
Citing their hope of averting a public health emergency, Gov. Jeff Landry and others say no inmates should be released until the state health department gives medical clearance. According to court documents, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said they would notify the state of upcoming releases but would not prevent an inmate from leaving if federal policy required it.
In a statement Wednesday night, ICE said it follows Centers for Disease Control guidelines to mitigate public health concerns and that its contact tracing practices ensure early detection of potential health problems.
“ICE coordinates with federal, state and local health officials when there is an anticipated release of a noncitizen to ensure both the continued treatment of the individual and to ensure that all public health concerns are addressed,” the agency said.
Legal proceedings in Louisiana are only precautionary at this point. At a news conference Wednesday, health officials said there had been no confirmed case of transmission from a person they identified as “patient zero” and the person was responding well to treatment.
Louisiana’s lawsuit requires U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain all Louisiana inmates from the two facilities pending a state medical examination. Without the warrant, the state argued, ICE would “release detainees onto Louisiana’s streets, its bus stations and its airports.”
The lawsuit said the inmate was infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, which affects the lungs. It says the variant is resistant to drugs and poses a serious danger. He also says the inmate was in contact with about 200 other people, both inmates and non-inmates.
“Studies show that the death rate is somewhere between 34-39 percent,” the state said in its lawsuit, which was filed Oct. 16 under seal and unsealed Tuesday. While still under seal, a judge told ICE to comply with the state’s request pending an Oct. 31 hearing in Lafayette.
The lawsuit says the woman tested “strongly positive” for tuberculosis in July, but she was placed in the general population in August. In September, sputum samples tested positive for tuberculosis, and the state health department received test results in October that were positive for the drug-resistant variant.
State officials could not explain Wednesday why a person suspected of having tuberculosis would be released into the general prison population.
Dr. Ralph Abraham, the state’s surgeon general, said the inmate is responding positively.
“To date, Patient Zero is almost asymptomatic, but is still receiving medication,” Abraham said Wednesday. Health officials said it could take six months to fully recover from a case of TB.
According to a heavily redacted portion of the lawsuit, Patient Zero entered the U.S. through Mexico this year and was apprehended in California in July. The individual flew with 100 other detainees to Alexandria and then boarded a bus with 40 others and traveled to Richwood Correctional Center in Monroe.
The inmate was diagnosed with tuberculosis at Richwood on July 23. Three days later she was transferred to Basil.
The state says it was told on Oct. 15 that ICE would give the state several hours notice to release each inmate, but would not comply with an order that the state health department give each a medical clearance.
Louisiana says it received an email from ICE that day saying, “If we are faced with a situation involving a detainee that we (sic) are legally required to release, we will contact LDH and allow time to undertake appropriate action and coordination of any transfer of LDH custody as required.”
State officials touted their press conference as addressing illegal immigration, but it was unclear whether Patient Zero had tuberculosis when she entered the United States or contracted it here.