Andrew Speaker

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003736012_tb06.html

A lawyer from Atlanta, Andrew Speaker, has a strain of drug-resistant tuberculosis. Doctors had told him not to go out into public, to reduce the risk of spreading tuberculosis. Andrew ignored the doctor's orders and instead went to Italy for his honeymoon. He was immediately retrieved from his trip and brought to Denver where he was quarantined in a special facility. After tests at the facility, Andrew came up negative for all of them. This doesn't mean that Andrew doesn't have tuberculosis though. Doctors have proven that 10 of 14 drugs used to treat tuberculosis had no effect on Andrews strain of TB. Although Andrew is infected with a dangerous strain of tuberculosis, scientists and doctors have found that he has a very low chance of spreading the disease. He seems perfectly healthy, but doctors are still trying to find a cure to eliminate his tuberculosis.

Isoniazid - Tuberculosis Drug

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/medmaster/a682401.html

Tuberculosis is treated with a drug called Isoniazid, which kills active tuberculosis bacteria. This drug is available as a tablet or a liquid. It can be used to prevent tuberculosis in a host that has come in contact with the disease. Although, the drug needs to be taken over a long period of time to ensure that all of the TB bacteria is destroyed. If the drug is not taken properly, or the person infected with tuberculosis stops taking the medication before the bacteria is gone, drug-resistant tuberculosis could be created. Different strains of drug-resistant tuberculosis are very dangerous and can't be cured by taking drugs. They are cureable but the patient needs to go through years of chemotherapy before they are cured of tuberculosis.

Gathered Materials

Over the weekend, Raymond, Alex, and I all got together at Raymond's house. We thought about what we needed to make our product really good. We were able to go to Home Depot to get a board and some hinges. We will be drawing a map of South Africa, and pasting it on our board. This will enable us to attach hinges to the map with flaps of wood, covering answers to questions about tuberculosis and its effect on South Africa. We only got a few hinges because we didn't want to get too much, and we could always get more later. The board we got was really long so we're going to cut off part of the board and use that to create the flaps.

Plans for the weekend

Raymond, Alex, and I have all decided to work on our project during the weekend. We have all chosen to work at Raymond's house, after gathering all of our supplies. Our main focus is to start our project, and have at least half of our map drawn. I will be drawing our map and it should be finished tuesday, June 5th. We hope to get a lot of work done during the weekend so that we'll be ahead of schedule, so we have time to revise and fix and problems that we might have.

We have also decided to research the present problem of tuberculosis, regarding the case of the man who was diagnosed with Multi Drug-resistant (MDR) Tuberculosis. This type of TB is immune to medical drugs used to treat tuberculosis. It is only treatable by long term chemotherapy. Currently, the man has been quarantined in Denver at a special facility. This case is becoming more serious because of the possibility that the man could have spread MDR TB, since it is contagious by contact.