brozneu的部落格

According to scientific studies, three million people die from Tuberculosis every year. A number of around eight million new discovered Tuberculosis conditions appear per year and 95% is estimated to be in developing areas. Countries like those in South America, Africa or Asia have the highest susceptibility to Tuberculosis due to the low living standards and the bad economic and social conditions.

Although the risk of Tuberculosis infection has decreased in the 1980', in the 1990' it already began to arise because of the high rate of immigration from countries with increased number of cases. Immigrant communities all difficult to observe, control or treat, because of the many differences between different races and cultures.

Immunity plays a tremendous role in prevention and treatment of Tuberculosis. A healthy immune system lowers the risk of catching Tuberculosis to 1 in 10 cases per year and only seldom an infected healthy organism gets to develop the active condition. HIV+ patients have a suppressed and weaken immune system and are mostly incapable to fight Mycobacterium. 1 in 10 patients with AIDS will surely suffer from active tuberculin infection, and from those with a positive skin test 1 in 2 will develop Tuberculosis. Epidemiological implications are very concerning as HIV cases tend to increase very rapidly.

One worrying issue of the TBC condition is the development of resistance to antibiotics due to fast bacterial mutations. The resistance phenomenon increases the risk of recurrence and makes recurrent cases more dangerous. Administering one single drug in the treatment of Tuberculosis tends to be dangerous as one single mutant bacillus in enough to trigger antibiotic-resistant Tuberculosis. Nowadays doctors prescribe the standard medication for this condition: Rifampicin, Isoniazide, Pyrazinamide and Ethambutol. Also Streptomycin is efficient in treating active Tuberculosis. This medication schedule will prevent the multiplication of all strains of Mycobacterium bacteria.

In our times Tuberculosis is well kept under control by good organized care systems in the civilized world. But slow developing countries are at high risk of an epidemic because of the low possibilities to prevent, supervise and treat Tuberculosis cases. Further laboratory studies are necessary to establish an efficient anti-Tuberculosis vaccine that might reduce the risk of catching the bacillus. The medical world must improve the diagnose methods as well as the available medication in order to face the hard battle with Tuberculosis. If no urgent measures are taken, the world's population risks a new wave of uncontrollable Tuberculosis.