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A deadly new strain of tuberculosis (TB) that is resistant to virtually all available medications is becoming increasingly common in South Africa.
According to Dr Karin Weyer, of the Medical Research Council, South Africa was in danger of an uncontrollable epidemic of drug-resistant TB and blamed the growing problem on the government's poor record of keeping TB patients on treatment.
"No attention is being given [by government health facilities] to patients who default on treatment," Weyer said.
"After 25 years working in TB treatment, I am extremely concerned - we see very little progress, and there seems to be complacency in general about TB."
TB is a common co-infection in HIV-positive people and the drug-resistant strain, which usually occurs when patients do not complete their course of medication, is particularly difficult to treat. TB patients with multidrug resistance who default on treatment a second time are vulnerable to an extremely drug-resistant form of the disease, XDR TB.
This has so far only been detected in 347 individuals worldwide, but a study conducted in rural KwaZulu-Natal found 53 cases in just over a year.
Dr Neel Gandhi, of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University in New York, who presented the findings to the International AIDS Conference in Toronto last week, said most of the cases in KwaZulu-Natal were transmitted from person to person rather than resulting from poor adherence to TB treatment. All but one of the patients diagnosed with XDR TB subsequently died.
About 25 percent of TB patients in South Africa drop out of treatment, well above the World Health Organisation target of less than 10 percent.
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions