Elsevier

Clinics in Chest Medicine

Volume 30, Issue 4, December 2009, Pages 621-636
Clinics in Chest Medicine

Global Burden and Epidemiology of Tuberculosis

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ccm.2009.08.017Get rights and content

Section snippets

Incidence

The number of new TB cases per capita each year (incidence) is the central measure of progress toward the ultimate goal of eliminating TB as a public health problem (see Box 1).13 It is not feasible to measure incidence by counting cases arising in cohorts under continuous observation because such studies would require cohorts of hundreds of thousands of people. Surveys of infection using tuberculin skin testing have been used in the past to derive estimates of incidence of TB disease, but the

Incidence

The WHO estimates that 9.27 million new cases of TB occurred in 2007 (139/100,000 population), compared with 9.24 million new cases (140/100,000 population) in 2006.2 Of these 9.27 million new cases, an estimated 44% or 4.1 million (61/100,000 population) were new smear-positive cases. India, China, Indonesia, Nigeria, and South Africa rank first to fifth in the total number of incident cases (Fig. 2). Among the 15 countries with the highest estimated TB incidence rates, 13 are in Africa, a

Trends in TB case notifications and rates of case detection and treatment success

The 196 countries reporting to the WHO in 2008 notified 5.6 million new and relapse cases in 2007, of which 2.6 million (46%) were new smear-positive cases. Notifications disaggregated by sex were reported for new pulmonary smear-positive TB cases by 170 countries. Of 2.55 million notifications, 1.65 million were male and 0.9 million were female, giving a male/female ratio of 1.8 for those aged 14 years and older. One of the factors associated with the male/female ratio in smear-positive TB

Can TB be eliminated by 2050?

TB can be controlled by preventing infection, stopping progression from infection to active disease, and rapid detection and treatment of active disease.52, 53 To date, only bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccination (provided to more than 80% of the annual birth cohort) and treatment of active TB using first-line drugs have been implemented on a large scale.54 With these interventions, global targets set for 2015 will be met in some regions, but on current trends, elimination (defined as an

Summary

Despite progress in our understanding of TB epidemiology and the availability of effective treatments, the number of new TB cases that occur each year is still rising, particularly in poor and otherwise disadvantaged populations.75 To reverse this trend and achieve global targets set for 2015 and 2050, major and urgent scaling up of the interventions and approaches included in the Stop TB Strategy is needed in most countries, combined with the successful development and application of new

First page preview

First page preview
Click to open first page preview

References (75)

  • S.B. Squire et al.

    The global plan to stop TB: a unique opportunity to address poverty and the Millennium Development Goals

    Lancet

    (2006)
  • C. Dye et al.

    Tuberculosis

  • M.C. Raviglione

    The global plan to stop TB, 2006–2015

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2006)
  • M.C. Raviglione

    The new Stop TB Strategy and the Global Plan to Stop TB, 2006–2015

    Bull World Health Organ

    (2007)
  • World Health Organization

    Global tuberculosis control: surveillance, planning, financing

    (2007)
  • C. Dye et al.

    Targets for global tuberculosis control

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2006)
  • A.L. Bierrenbach et al.

    Rev Saude Publica

    (2007)
  • C. Dye et al.

    The decline of tuberculosis epidemics under chemotherapy: a case study in Morocco

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2007)
  • J. Mansoer et al.

    New methods for estimating the tuberculosis case detection rate in high-HIV prevalence countries: the example of Kenya

    Bull World Health Organ

    (2009)
  • C. Dye et al.

    Consensus statement. Global burden of tuberculosis: estimated incidence, prevalence, and mortality by country. WHO Global Surveillance and Monitoring Project

    JAMA

    (1999)
  • E. Botha et al.

    From suspect to patient: tuberculosis diagnosis and treatment initiation in health facilities in South Africa

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2008)
  • G. Meintjes et al.

    Patient and provider delay in tuberculosis suspects from communities with a high HIV prevalence in South Africa: a cross-sectional study

    BMC Infect Dis

    (2008)
  • L.J. Veron et al.

    DOTS Expansion: will we reach the 2005 targets?

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2004)
  • I. Baussano et al.

    Undetected burden of tuberculosis in a low-prevalence area

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2006)
  • M.W. Borgdorff et al.

    Using capture-recapture methods to study recent transmission of tuberculosis

    Int J Epidemiol

    (2004)
  • J. Cailhol et al.

    Incidence of tuberculous meningitis in France, 2000: a capture-recapture analysis

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2005)
  • J.P. Crofts et al.

    Estimating tuberculosis case mortality in England and Wales, 2001–2002

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2008)
  • Na Vanh et al.

    Record-linkage and capture-recapture analysis to estimate the incidence and completeness of reporting of tuberculosis in England 1999–2002

    Epidemiol Infect

    (2008)
  • P. Glaziou et al.

    Tuberculosis prevalence surveys: rationale and cost

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2008)
  • S. Soemantri et al.

    Three-fold reduction in the prevalence of tuberculosis over 25 years in Indonesia

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2007)
  • C. Dye et al.

    Evaluating the impact of tuberculosis control: number of deaths prevented by short-course chemotherapy in China

    Int J Epidemiol

    (2000)
  • T.E. Tupasi et al.

    The 1997 nationwide tuberculosis prevalence survey in the Philippines

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (1999)
  • Y.P. Hong et al.

    The seventh nationwide tuberculosis prevalence survey in Korea, 1995

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (1998)
  • E.L. Korenromp et al.

    The measurement and estimation of tuberculosis mortality

    Int J Tuberc Lung Dis

    (2009)
  • Cited by (0)

    View full text