Almost every second person (47%) diagnosed in 2014 was a late presenter or with indication of advanced infection. This means that these individuals are only diagnosed when their immune system already starts to fail.
In EU, only 1 in every 3 MDR TB patients has a successful treatment outcome; more than half either die, fail treatment or default (stop taking treatment). XDR TB has even worse treatment outcomes: only 1 in 4 patients finishes treatment successfully.
ECDC promotes the performance of external quality assessment (EQA) schemes, in which laboratories are sent simulated clinical specimens or bacterial isolates for testing by routine or reference laboratory methods. EQA schemes, or laboratory proficiency testing, provide information about the accuracy of different characterisation and typing methods as well as antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) and the sensitivity of the methods in place to detect a certain pathogen or novel resistance patterns.
The XXVIII IUSTI (International Union Against Sexually Transmitted Infections) Europe Congress addressed the broad range of science and clinical practice in the field of sexually transmitted infections and HIV.
The 2015 meeting of the Joint ECDC/WHO Surveillance Network for Tuberculosis was held in The Hague, the Netherlands, on 26-27 May 2015. The meeting was organised jointly by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and WHO/Europe for TB surveillance experts from WHO European region including European Union/European Economic Area (EU/EEA) Member States (MSs). The participants included 47 nominated contact points for TB surveillance from 42 countries, as well as experts from ECDC and WHO/Europe, WHO headquarters and country offices. In addition, experts from seven EU Enlargement Countries and from the KNCV TB Foundation (the Netherlands) attended the meeting as observers.