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New Disease Figures to be Released in Health Scare

KWGS News File Photo

TULSA, Okla. (AP) — The Tulsa Health Department is expected to release updated totals of patients who have tested positive for several diseases amid a public health scare that involves thousands of patients of a local oral surgeon.

The update is expected Thursday.

Health officials in March urged roughly 7,000 patients of Dr. W. Scott Harrington to be tested for hepatitis and the virus that causes AIDS.

Tulsa's Health Department reported last week that four more of Harrington's patients had tested positive for hepatitis C, bringing the total to 69. One more patient had tested positive for hepatitis B, bringing that total to four. One or two patients tested positive for HIV.

It is not clear if the patients got the diseases at Harrington's Tulsa-area clinics.

More than 3,700 patients have been tested.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.

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