In the 1960s medical authorities thought it was only a matter of time before tuberculosis was wiped out world wide. Instead, government health care systems grew complacent and AIDS led to a resurgence of the diseases and the emergence of drug-resistant strains of TB. Now the World Health Organization reports that in 1999 there were 8.4 million new cases of TB reported, up from 8.0 million in 1997.
If current trends hold, there will be 10.5 million new cases by 2005. Much of those new cases are in the developing world, especially in Africa where the high incidence of AIDS fueled a 20 percent increase in cases of TB.
Tuberculosis is also a major problem in the former Soviet republics. In Russia, for example, there are 30,000 annual deaths from the disease which is believed to be endemic in that nation’s poorly maintained prisons (some estimates claim that 10 to 25 percent of all prisoners in Russian jails suffer from TB).
Sources:
Global Tuberculosis Control Report Summary. World Health Organization, 2001.
Russia faces TB time bomb. Carolyn Wyatt, The BBC, March 24, 2001.
Worldwide threat of TB. The BBC, March 24, 2001.