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Mexican man with tuberculosis crossed border 76 times, report says
By the Editorial Staff
ATLANTA (ImmigrationNewsman.com) – A Mexican national infected with tuberculosis crossed the U.S. border 76 times and took multiple domestic flights in the U.S. last year, according to the Washington Times .
The newspaper, citing documents and interviews with the Customs and Border Protection (CBP), said Amado Isidro Armendariz Amaya has applied for an I-94 permit and made at least one more trip across the U.S. border on May 21.
It quoted a spokesman of the CBP as saying that a “be-on-the-lookout” alert has been issued to border agents after it was determined that Amaya may have used an alias.
Health officials warned border agents on April 16 that Amaya was infected with the contagious illness, but it took Homeland Security officials more than six weeks to issue an alert to its border inspectors, the Times said.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the fatality rate for people with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis or MDR-TB was 72 percent to 89 percent. MDR is the same strain of tuberculosis that threw health officials into panic when an Atlanta-based lawyer, who was believed to have acquired the infection, slipped into the U.S. from Europe via Canada .
In 1990 and 1991, the CDC investigated nearly 200 cases of MDR in Florida and New York City . In hospitals where MDR patients were taken, eight heath-care workers also developed the illness, including four who eventually died, the CDC Web site said. CDC and local health officials also investigated MDR outbreaks in two hospitals in New York and the state correctional system, where several inmates and a prison guard have died of the illness.
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Border Patrol agents face increased violent assaults, report says
By the Editorial Staff
ATLANTA (ImmigrationNewsman.com) – Violent assaults against Border Patrol agents increased by 38 percent compared to the same period last year, the Texas newspaper Alice Echo-News Journal said.
The newspaper quoted David Aguilar, chief of the U.S. Border Patrol, as saying that agents have been assaulted 250 times along the Mexican border from Oct. 1 through Dec. 16. During the same period last year, 181 assaults were recorded, it said.
Assaults against agents are more frequently occurring from Mexico immediately south of the border where organized criminal gangs and elements have little to no fear of apprehension or arrest by Mexican authorities.
Immigration Newsman file photo
US Border Patrol agent Scott Amister says his boat has been fired on by smugglers not far from the Gateway International bridge connecting Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Mexico.
<Illegal border crossers have assaulted agents with rocks, Molotov cocktails and, in some incidents, even fired shots, the daily said. It said helicopters flying in support of Border Patrol Agents on the ground have also received gunfire recently.
“The American public and the border community must understand that this situation is no longer about illegal immigration or narcotics trafficking," Aguilar said. "It is about criminals and smuggling organizations fighting our agents with lethal force to take over a part of American territory so that they can conduct criminal activity.”
In May 2006, President Bush called for an additional 6,000 new Border Patrol agents by the end of December 2008, increasing the number of agents from 12,349 to 18,319. Officials say the new agents will most likely be assigned to the southwest border while about 1,000 experienced agents will be transferred to the northern border.
BORDER PATROL FACTS
The United States Border Patrol, the uniformed law-enforcement arm that patrols 8,000 miles of land and coastal border of the country, was officially established on July 1, 1924. Its goal is to detect and prevent the illegal entry of contraband and undocumented immigrants. In May 2006, President Bush called for an additional 6,000 Border Patrol agents by the end of December 2008.
- Workforce: 12,349 men and women supported by sophisticated technology, vehicles, aircraft and other related equipment.
- Illegal entrants arrested by agents last year: 1.4 million
- Worth of Narcotics seized in 1997 (the latest year for which figures are immediately available): $2 billion
- Number of agents killed while on duty since 1924: 81
- Hispanics among agents: 38.4 percent
- Female agents: 4.5 percent
(Source: U.S. Government Accountability Office)
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