Each sick with active TB can infect between 10 and 15 people

MADRID, 21 ( EUROPA PRESS)

“every patient of active TB can infect between 10 and 15 people, if it is not treated”, warns the doctor Juan José Palacios of the unit of Mycobacteria of Asturias Regional reference on the occasion of the ' World TB Day ', which takes place this Saturday.

For this reason, the Spanish society of infectious diseases and Clinical Microbiology (SEIMC), wants to raise awareness in society of the importance charged by prevention and early detection of this disease, “which remains one of the most important causes of mortality in the world”.

Tuberculosis, which spreads through coughing or sneezing, particularly affects the lungs, but it can cause injuries to any organ or tissue. The most frequent symptoms are coughing up coughing, sometimes with blood in the sputum, fever, lack of appetite and weight loss, night sweating.

In general, the disease particularly affects people living in conditions of poverty, malnutrition, overcrowding, and is related to other chronic diseases and immunodeficiencies such as virus HIV.

Potential VACCINES

Tuberculosis now boasts several vaccine candidates that around a dozen have already reached the clinical stage of the experiments. Most are based on antigens recognized by the immune system during the initial stages of infection.

In particular, one of them, H56/IC3 has obtained encouraging results in animals and, this year, will begin his trial in humans. It is a vaccine of triple merger, which combines two proteins that the bacteria produced in the early stage of infection (Ag85B and ESAT-6) with a protein produced in the late phase (Rv2660c).

In spite of that Spain was one of the countries of Western Europe with an increased incidence of tuberculosis, at present the number of cases has been to more than half in the last decade and rates are similar to those of the rest of developed countries.

In this regard, Palacios credited advances, on the one hand, to universal access to health services and, on the other, currently available in the same diagnostic technology, allowing fast and accurate diagnosis.

The rate of incidence in 2011 in Spain was between 15 and 20 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, depending on the autonomous community. Those with higher rates were Ceuta, Galicia, Melilla and La Rioja, according to data from the National Center for epidemiology.

However, still noting a predominance of cases in men, being young adults between 25 and 34 years old have the highest rates, with almost double the cases in men than in women.

Worldwide, a third of the population is infected by ' mycobacterium tuberculosis '. That third, between 5 and 10 percent will develop the disease throughout his life.