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 Britain has one of the highest TB rates in western Europe and London
is known as the continent's "TB capital".
TB rates in the United Kingdom are nearly five times those in the
United States. If current trends continue, England alone will have
more TB cases than the whole of the U.S. in two years.
"TB should be consigned to the past, and yet it is occurring in
England at higher rates than most of Western Europe," said Paul
Cosford, a director at the government's health agency, Public Health
England (PHE). "This situation must be reversed."
Often thought of as a disease of the past, when it was dubbed "the
white plague" for rendering its victims pale and feverish, TB has
stubbornly persisted in Britain. It occurs mainly in areas of
poverty and deprivation.
The bacterial disease is hard to treat and contagious, passing on
via the coughs and sneezes of an infected person.
In 2013, 7,290 TB cases were reported in England, an incidence of
13.5 cases per 100,000 of the population. TB cases are concentrated
in urban "hot spots" in London, Leicester, Birmingham, Luton,
Manchester and Coventry.
PHE officials say TB clinics in London manage more cases a year than
those in all other western European capitals together.
Drug resistant TB is also an increasing problem, with cases of
multi-drug resistant (MDR) TB rising from 28 cases in England in
2000, to 68 in 2013.
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PHE's plan is to work with the National Health Service (NHS)to
target the most vulnerable people, improving access to screening,
testing and treatment services as well as outreach programs such as
"Find and Treat" mobile health units.
Bruce Keogh, NHS England's medical director, said the NHS would
focus its 10 million pounds contribution on screening and treatment.
"Our goal is to eliminate TB as a public health problem," he said.
(Editing by Tom Heneghan)
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