Question: Do you think that tuberculosis will become a real problem in the UK again?

Matt Bilton answered on 17 Nov 2014:

I think that TB is currently an issue in the UK – in 2012 the UK had ~10,000 cases of TB, which was the same as in the whole of the USA. In fact, London has the unfortunate claim to being the TB capital of Europe. Even so – the UK is a low risk country for TB.

The bigger issue for me though, is multi drug resistant (MDR) tuberculosis. MDR-TB is just as infectious as drug sensitive TB but much harder to treat. Instead of taking 6 months of antibiotics to clear the bacteria, it takes about 2 years – that’s an injection every day and about 10,000 pills in total! People with MDR-TB most likely remain infectious for longer after starting treatment and the side effects of the antibiotic chemotherapy are much worse.

We live in a global society – if MDR-TB rates are allowed to rise elsewhere in the world, then the chances of MDR-TB rates going up in the UK rise too. MDR-TB spreads when those who are sick with it aren’t able to get treatment – something all too common in the world’s less economically developed countries. In fact only about 1 in 5 of those with MDR-TB get treatment for it, allowing the disease to spread relatively unhindered.

In the UK we have an excellent system that allows people to get diagnosed and treated – and for those most at risk for becoming infected to be identified and monitored. This puts the UK in a very strong position to protect citizens from TB. However, if we want to make sure diseases like MDR-TB don’t spread in the UK – we need to do more to help make sure they’re not allowed to take hold elsewhere in the world too. Otherwise, yes – I think that TB can become a real problem again in the UK.