The rate of decline in tuberculosis cases reported in the U.S. slowed in 2007, but cases of the disease reached their lowest levels since tracking began in 1953, according to a study published Friday in CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, Bloombergreports. There were 13,293 TB cases reported in the U.S. in 2007, with the TB rate declining by 4.2% from 2006 to 4.4 cases per 100,000 people, according to the report.
Since 1992, CDC has "seen a steady improvement in the rates of TB in the United States, but since 2000, we've documented the fact that the rate of decline has slowed," Thomas Navin, a CDC epidemiologist and author of the report, said. According to CDC, the average annual decline in TB cases was 7.3% from 1993 to 2000, Reutersreports. Navin said that 646 people died of TB in the U.S. in 2005.The report found that almost 60% of TB cases occurred among people who were born outside the U.S. and that more than half occurred among people from India, Mexico, the Philippines and Vietnam. Among foreign-born people, the TB rate was 9.7 times higher than those who were born in the U.S.. Hispanics accounted for more TB cases than any other ethnic group and were seven times more likely to have TB than whites, CDC reported. Blacks were nearly eight times more likely to have TB than whites, and Asians were 23 times more likely to have the disease than whites, the report found.
According to the report, HIV test results were available for 7,708 out of the total number of U.S. TB cases in 2007. The data showed that 11.3% of people with TB also were living with HIV, Reuters reports.
CDC in 2006 recorded four cases of extensively drug-resistant TB, which is resistant to the two most potent first-line treatments and some of the available second-line drugs. Preliminary data also showed two XDR-TB cases in 2007. Multi-drug resistant TB data for 2007 is not yet available. However, there were 116 cases of MDR-TB in 2006, which comprised 1.1% of the total number of TB cases in the U.S., according to the report.
The numbers indicate that the U.S. is lagging behind in its goal of eliminating TB by 2010, which is defined by reaching a rate of less than one case per one million people annually, Bloomberg reports. The goal was set in 1989 and included a target of 3.5 cases per 100,000 people by 2000.
Source-Kaiser Family Foundation
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