SARS COV-2 AND TB CO-INFECTION AMONG CURRENT TB PATIENTS IN CHENNAI, NIRT, INDIA

Abstract


During the COVID-19 pandemic, bidirectional screening of patients was recommended among TB and COVID-19 patients owing to the overlap of the respiratory symptoms. In this study, we studied the co-existence of COVID-19 along with TB among the TB patients who visited NTEP clinics in Chennai. Of the 384 bacteriologically confirmed TB cases, 22 of them were tested positive for SARS-CoV2 by Standard Q COVID-19 Antigen test. In this study, we also compared the treatment outcomes for both co-infected and only TB groups along with comparison of their baseline characteristics. Among the limited cases of TB-COVID-19 co-infection, we did not observe any significant differences between the two groups in treatment outcomes and/or clinical characteristics. As a high TB burden country with infant BCG vaccination program in place, more studies are required to validate the effect of COVID-19 infection among bacteriologically confirmed TB cases.

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