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Mike Mitka

JAMA. 2001;285:1008.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 118 words of the full text and any section headings.

Although the overall risk of tuberculosis (TB) has been decreasing in recent years, continued vigilance is needed within institutional settings such as hospitals and prisons and in the community at large, says an Institute of Medicine (IOM) report released last month, Tuberculosis in the Workplace (http://www.nap.edu/books/0309073308/html).

The IOM committee said that TB remains a threat to some workers in health care and correctional facilities and to some other US workers. The evidence suggests that where TB is uncommon or where basic infection control measures are in place, the risk to health care workers approaches community levels. The primary risk to workers now comes from patients, inmates, or others with unsuspected and undiagnosed infectious TB.