HEALTH chiefs have defended their decision not to offer routine jabs for schoolchildren, following news that a pupil at Easingwold School had developed TB.

Selby and York Primary Care Trust said the effectiveness of routine BCG immunisation against TB was limited, particularly in areas such as North Yorkshire, where the disease was uncommon.

Acting director of public health, Rachel Johns, said the policy of not offering the jab was developed a number of years ago on the grounds of limited effectiveness.

"Local advice from the Health Protection Agency is that these grounds remain," she said. "This policy will continue to be reviewed by Selby and York PCT."

The Evening Press revealed last night how an unidentified student at Easingwold was responding well to treatment after being diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis. Experts said the risk to other pupils was "minimal", but TB screening had been offered to all who had had close and prolonged contact with the student.

Doctors say the BCG jab is not a straightforward solution to TB.

Dr Ebere Okereke and Dr Louise Coole, consultants in communicable disease control at the agency, said it was much more complicated than, for example, vaccination against meningitis, whooping cough or tetanus - which were at least 90 to 95 per cent effective.

"Unfortunately this does not apply to BCG. Whilst BCG vaccination is very good at protecting infants from severe forms of the disease, it is limited in the protection it offers to older children and adults against the more common lung disease.

"This is particularly the case in areas where TB is uncommon, such as North Yorkshire."

They stressed that TB was not highly infectious, like an illness such as chicken pox.

"A person needs to spend a long time in close contact with a case of TB before the infection can spread. As TB in North Yorkshire is uncommon, the risk of a child in this area having close contact with a case of TB and acquiring the disease is very small."

The BCG, which stands for Bacillus Calmette Guerin, was widely given in the past to teenagers as a jab in the arm to immunise them against TB.

Vale of York MP Anne McIntosh said she hoped the youngster affected would make a full recovery and that this would remain a single, isolated case.

She said she supported the trust's policy on BCGs, and would like a review if any more cases arose in future.

Updated: 09:20 Saturday, March 13, 2004