One more is added to the list of innumerable problems caused by the pandemic: tuberculosis.
The (SEPAR) warns that the efforts focused on caring for patients with coronavirus during the pandemic have resulted in a 23.9% drop in the notification of tuberculosis cases in Spain.
And specialists in pulmonology warn that the problem is not only that fewer cases have been reported, but that this has meant that many fewer patients have been diagnosed.
And the consequence has been an increase in mortality from tuberculosis.
Primary care, emergencies, health centers have been forced during these two years to focus on the almost exclusively, forgetting some diseases.
Tuberculosis has not been an exception.
As the doctor explains John F Medinapulmonologist and director of the SEPAR Tuberculosis Research Program.
“We have seen that the notification of cases has gone down. But most likely, this has not happened because we actually have fewer cases of tuberculosis, but because fewer have been diagnosed.”
Tuberculosis, in figures
Tuberculosis continues to be one of the deadliest infectious diseases.
In the world, more than 4,000 people die from this cause every day, and about 30,000 fall ill from this respiratory infection.
Some data that alarm specialists, especially since tuberculosis is a preventable and curable disease.
In Spain as a whole, the notification of cases has fallen by 23.9% in 2021, compared to the last two years.
Thus, in 2021, 3,400 cases of tuberculosis were reported, 7.6% less than in 2020. And, in 2020, 3,681 cases were reported, 16.3% less than in 2019.
But this decline in notifications does not correspond to a decline in infections. As shown by the fact that pulmonologists have observed a rise in mortality from tuberculosis.
While in 2018 mortality was 0.90%, after evaluating the treatment results of 464 cases, in 2020 it was 1.30% of 149 cases evaluated.
Regarding the proportion, the number of cases autochthonous has been higher than that of patients imported from abroadalthough it has been equalizing in the two years of the pandemic.
symptoms of tuberculosis
Tuberculosis is a respiratory infection caused by the Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
It is spread through the air when an already infected person coughs, sneezes or spits, releasing the disease-causing bacteria into the air.
This disease can be get when you are exposed to a person with tuberculosis for a long time who does not receive treatment.
And those who live in cramped conditions in a closed space and in worse socioeconomic conditions, for example, in homes with poor ventilation, are at greater risk of contracting it.
But, in addition, pulmonologists remember that tuberculosis can be asymptomatic, with which the patient does not know that he has it or is aware that he is spreading it.
The most common symptoms are cough and expectoration.
When the cough lasts for more than three weeks, it should lead to suspicion of this disease.
Besides, can cause weight loss, evening sweats, and sometimes coughing up bloodwhich is the most alarming symptom and the one that usually leads to the diagnosis more quickly.
Tuberculosis in pandemic
“Tuberculosis worries us because it can give subacute or less expressive symptoms, and part of these symptoms are common to those of COVID-19.
That is why it is important that the doctor think about it again when making the diagnosis of any patient with these symptoms.
And it is that, as Dr. Medina warns: “Tuberculosis has not gone away. It is still here, among us.”
The Covid-19 pandemic has influenced the transmission of tuberculosis in several ways.
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The widespread use of masks has acted as a barrier to stop the spread of tuberculosis.
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The period of confinement has made it difficult for this infection to spread from one family nucleus to another.
But, on the other side of the coin, confined people, in overcrowded situations, have been more exposed to Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
A fact that has caused the appearance of cases of childhood tuberculosis. Because children are in greater contact with adults, at homethe chances of minors becoming infected have increased.
“The current situation in Ukraine is not going to help either and it is going to generate an added difficulty for the treatment and management of tuberculosis. Because migrations constitute a big problem to be able to control all patients, treat them and follow them. For our society it will be a challenge”, adds the pulmonologist.
Drug shortages, research and the future
Added to the health challenge of tuberculosis is another problem: the worldwide shortage of anti-tuberculosis drugs, such as rifampicin and pyrazinamide.
These drugs are administered in combinations to treat tuberculosis, which is making the treatment of this disease difficult and increasing the risk of resistance.
Currently, research in the field of this disease focuses so much on getting a vaccine, among which is in a quite advanced phase that of the researcher Carlos Martinof the University of…