Patients who do not want to be treated can be brought to a closed facility by court order. The only station in Germany for such cases is currently being built in Upper Franconia.
A nationwide unique facility is currently being built in the Lichtenfels district. A ward is being built for tuberculosis patients who actually do not want to be treated, but who are admitted there by court order because of the risk of infection. It is scheduled to open in 2022, there is space for up to 24 patients from all over Germany. The new building will cost around seven million euros. There are people in Germany who develop tuberculosis but refuse treatment, explained a spokesman for the health facilities of the Upper Franconia district (GeBO). This facility is needed to prevent them from infecting others, but at the same time being able to be treated themselves. The accommodation is then based on the Infection Protection Act.
Many of those affected would also suffer from a mental disorder and would also need help in this area. Such a facility previously existed in Parsberg in the Upper Palatinate, but the Upper Palatinate District does not continue pulmonary medicine at the location. For this reason, the only closed tuberculosis ward in Germany will in future be located in the Obermain Clinic in Kutzenberg near Lichtenfels, where patients with lung diseases have been treated for many decades.
Tuberculosis is caused by bacteria that mainly affect the lungs. The pathogens are transmitted through droplets that are released when you cough or sneeze. In 2020 the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) registered 4127 cases. That is 14.2 percent less than in the previous year, according to the epidemiological bulletin that the RKI published about the disease in 2021. In 2010, 4,330 cases were known. According to this, around ten million people are newly diagnosed with tuberculosis worldwide every year. 1.4 million died in 2019 directly from the disease or from its consequences.
There is a special security concept with video surveillance and motion detectors for the new building in Kutzenberg, including a four-meter-high wall around the building. Treatment for tuberculosis lasts for several months. If left untreated, an infection can be fatal.