More than 50,000 new cases of tuberculosis were reported in Zimbabwe in 1999, while Swaziland attended to over 40,000 new cases during the same period, media reports said on Thursday.
The reports said in both countries the majority of the TB cases are also infected by the HIV/AIDS disease. In Zimbabwe, between 50 and 75 percent of these cases were linked to HIV/AIDS, while in Swaziland a 1998 study indicated that 58 percent of the TB patients were also infected by HIV, added the reports.
Both countries, however, have set up centres to provide free TB treatment as well as to closely monitor the disease. Zimbabwe, said the reports, has been experiencing an upsurge in TB cases since 1987 when the first HIV/AIDS cases were reported in the country.
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