World TB Day, March 24, 2016, is an opportunity to raise awareness about the enormous burden of TB. With 1.5 million TB-associated deaths per year, TB is a top infectious killer worldwide.
Key Facts:
- In 2014, 9.6 million people fell ill with TB and 1.5 million died from the disease.
- Over 95% of TB deaths occur in low- and middle income countries, and it is among the top 5 causes of death for women ages 15 to 44.
- In 2014, an estimated 1 million children (0-14 years) became ill with TB and 140,000 children died from the disease.
- In 2014, about 80% of reported TB cases occurred in 22 countries. The 6 countries with the largest number of incident cases were India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan, People’s Republic of China, and South Africa.
- An estimated 43 million lives were saved through TB diagnosis and treatment between 2000 and 2014.
What is a TB Infection?
Tuberculosis (TB) is caused by a bacterium called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The bacteria usually attack the lungs, but can attack any part of the body such as the kidney, spine, and brain.
TB is easily transmitted from person to person through the air. When a person develops active TB disease the symptoms (cough, fever, night sweats, weight loss etc.) may be mild for many months leading to delays in seeking care. Such delays may result in increased transmission of the infection to others (10-15 people over the course of a year), and an increase in the severity of TB infection. In such instances, TB infection can spreads outside of the lungs to other parts of the body. TB infection is also harmful to patients in a state of immunosuppression such as HIV, or those who are drug resistant. In such instances, mortality rates are high. Thus, diagnostic tests to aid in early detection of TB infection are very important.
Detection of TB is done by a TB skin test (TST) and/or TB blood test, following by confirmation with chest X-Ray and/or testing of a sputum sample.
CTK’s Onsite TB IgG/IgM Features
- Simple procedure that requires minimal training and no equipment
- Provides results in 10-15 minutes
- Simultaneously detects anti-TB IgG & IgM
- Uses blood specimen, instead of sputum, which is difficult to collect
- Aids in determining pulmonary and extra-pulmonary TB
CTK offers several other infectious disease diagnostic products relevant to TB infection, such as:
- HIV
- Tropical IVD products such as malaria and dengue
- Respiratory IVD products such as Strep A and Influenza A/B