The world is in danger of TB becoming untreatable, British experts warned yesterday.
Writing for World TB Day, experts accused governments of being "complacent and politically neglectful" as the disease increasingly becomes drug-resistant.
Experts were gathering in London today for a World TB Day conference at University College London.
They will hear that in parts of central Asia and eastern Europe more than 30% of new TB patients have multi-drug resistant disease. In the UK some 81 cases of this form of the disease were reported in 2011.
Writing in The Lancet, Professor Alimuddin Zumla and his colleagues from the college say: "A major conceptual change and visionary global leadership are needed to move away from the conventional view that tuberculosis is only a disease of poor nations.
"The widespread emergence of extensively-drug resistant tuberculosis could lead to virtually untreatable tuberculosis.
"With ease of international travel, and increased rates of multi-drug resistant tuberculosis in eastern Europe, central Asia, and elsewhere, the threat and range of the spread of untreatable tuberculosis is very real."
They add: "The global economic crisis and reduced investments in health services threaten national tuberculosis programmes and the gains made in global tuberculosis control.
"The world needs to acknowledge the serious threat of drug-resistant tuberculosis, before it overwhelms health systems."
Lancet 24 March 2013 [abstract]
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