Tuberculosis: An ongoing challenge?

During 2000/2001, a Community Care Area serving a population of 100,000 notified a total of 21 new cases of pulmonary Tuberculosis (TB) to the Department of Public Health. Of these 21 cases, 8 patients (38%) lived in a city suburb. This suburb of 763 publicly provided houses (population 3000) is an area of high unemployment, high levels of substance abuse and homelessness, dysfunctional interpersonal relationships and high dependency on welfare services. An Outbreak Control Team (OCT) was formed specifically to investigate possible links between the 8 cases, and to implement prevention and control measures in accordance with national and local guidelines