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TUBERCULOSIS (TB)

According to the statistics of the WHO, TB kills more young people and adults than any other infectious disease in the world. It causes more deaths than AIDS and Malaria combined. Although the use of penicillin and antibiotics have caused the decline of this disease in some countries, hot spots of this illness still exist in eastern Europe, south east Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

Tuberculosis Numbers that were seemingly beginning to decrease began to rise in the 1980’s with the emergence of Aids. Scientists now say that the number of people with TB around the world has reached a ten year high.

In the developed world this disease is primarily seen in the elderly, while in developing countries it is more commonly seen in young adults.

Each person, left untreated with active TB will infect on the average between 10 and 15 people a year. The difficult issue, however, is that not everyone who infected with TB actually develops symptoms, and therefore TB testing is required to figure out who is infected especially since this disease can lie dormant for years.

  • Someone in the world is infected with TB every second.
  • One third of the world’s population is currently infected with TB.
  • 5-10% of people who are infected with TB (but who are not infected with HIV) become sick or infectious at some time in their life. People who have HIV in conjunction with TB are more likely to develop the symptoms of TB.

TB DISEASE PER REGION OF THE WORLD

World Region Number Thousands % Of Global Total TB Mortality Per 100,000 Of Population
Africa 2,529 29% 74.0
The Americas 352 4% 5.5
Eastern Mediterranean 565 6% 21.0
Europe 445 5% 7.4
South East Asia 2,993 34% 31.0
Western Pacific 1,927 22% 17.0
Global 8,811 100% 24.0

The goal of the WHO at this time is to reduce the number of cases of active TB, by using advance screening methods and treatments programs. One thing is clear; the interaction of TB and HIV together is causing a major problem in effectively warding off this disease. The reason for this seems to be the decreased immunity of HIV compromised individuals combining with the TB virus to form a deadly combination and in regions of a combined endemic situation with both of these diseases present as in parts of Africa, it has become increasingly evident that these two diseases together make the effects much more devastating.