By: Candess Zona-Mendola of MakeFoodSafe
News broke this week that there are two confirmed cases of Legionnaires’ disease linked to the Bronx apartments by Mitchell-Lama Properties. Both of the confirmed cases are residents of the Tracey Towers in Norwood. The local health authorities have launched an investigation into the outbreak and have put the building’s tenants on notice. At this point, it appears the health department is treating these cases as a Legionnaires outbreak.
According to reports, the city’s Health Department says it’s evaluating the water systems at the Tracey Towers on West Moshulu Parkway in the Norwood neighborhood at this time. The agencies confirmed that “tenants can still use and drink water except for showering because it could create a mist” and “residents are urged to take baths instead.”
At a meeting Tuesday night inside the building’s community room, Ricky Wong, director of Community Affairs at DOH, informed the tenants of the department’s plan to start testing the building’s water for the bacteria. He said that water testing could “potentially happen at the earliest by the end of this week.” It could take a few weeks for these results to come back.
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