
THE BLACK ANGELS
A Nurse's Story
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Tuberculosis is caused by a bacterium called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The disease commonly attacks the lungs, but can attack any part of the body.
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Tuberculosis is spread from one person to the next through the air when people who have active TB in their lungs cough, speaking, or sneezing. People with Latent TB do not spread the disease.
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According to the World Health Organization, in 2021, an estimated 10.6 million were infected with tuberculosis worldwide. Six million men, 3.4 million women and 1.2 million children. TB is present in all countries and age groups. But TB is curable and preventable.
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Over 80% of cases and deaths are in low- and middle-income countries.
Film Discussion
The extraordinary story of 300 African American nurses known as The Black Angels. Hailed out of Staten Island, New York at Seaview Hospital. Traveling from many states to care for patients with tuberculosis when there was no cure and white nurses refused, they did the unthinkable.
Seaview hospital was the largest sanitorium for tuberculosis in the 1940's and it held over 2000 patients. It would become the birth place for clinical trials for the cure of tuberculosis, led by Dr. Edward H. Robitzek.
This story gives homage to these nurses; their contributions to medicine, research and science. We introduce you to Black Angel, Marjorie Tucker Reed and her journey through a time of segregation, racism and one of the deadliest pandemics in the history of the United States. In this film she gives her last interview before her death.
Tuberculosis Facts




