Both hid the symptoms from their families. Only when he was at the point where he could no longer pull himself out of bed one morning, to go to school, did he tell his mother what was going on. She realized how serious it was and took him right to the doctor. This is also a period when kids spend a lot of time with their friends, doing activities out of the house. Parents don't see their kids all that much.
Many physicians also misdiagnose it.
Simply because TB seemed to disappear after the 1950s, when drugs to treat the disease became available and sanitation, nutrition, and housing and working conditions dramatically improved. But then it seemed to mysteriously reappear several years ago, and few people are really sure what it looks like. Lee Reichman, MD, director of the TB Center - say that it may have gone underground, but it never really went away. That's why most of us are so shocked when it crops up almost next door. And there have been many other TB cases in young people.