HIV-TB 'double trouble' warning

TB can lead to pneumonia
BBC News

One in four TB deaths is HIV-related, twice as many as previously recognised, experts say.

Co-infection remains a major challenge and more efforts are needed to spot and treat the two conditions in tandem, says the World Health Organization.

HIV and tuberculosis services must be joined up if we are to achieve global disease control, warn disease experts.

Despite TB killing more people with HIV than any other disease, in 2008 only 1% of people with HIV had a TB screen.

Problems compounded

HIV disables the immune system, leaving the body vulnerable to opportunistic infections like TB.

In Sub-Saharan Africa, HIV has caused TB incidence to triple since the 1990s and in some countries 80% of TB patients are co-infected with HIV.

TB is preventable, treatable and curable yet it kills close to two million people a year Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams

In 2007, worldwide there were an estimated 1.37 million new cases of TB among HIV-infected people and 456,000 deaths.

The situation is made more urgent by increasing rates of drug-resistant TB in areas with a high prevalence of HIV.

Again, in 2007, an estimated 500,000 people had multidrug-resistant TB, but less than 1% of them were receiving treatments meeting WHO's recommended standards.

Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of WHO, said: "These findings point to an urgent need to find, prevent and treat TB in people living with HIV and to test for HIV in all patients with TB.

"Countries can only do that through stronger collaborative programmes and stronger health systems that address both diseases."

Another pressure is financing the measures in the current, unstable economic climate. read more...