A total of 303 cases of extreme drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) have been confirmed across the country, the Department of Health said on Thursday.
”They are in the hospitals, they are on treatment. Some of them have died,” said the department’s head of TB, Dr Lindiwe Mvusi.
Mvusi did not have details at hand of how many had died.
The department recorded 263 cases in KwaZulu-Natal, 10 cases each in the Eastern Cape and the North West, nine in Gauteng, six in the Free State, three in Limpopo and two in the Northern Cape.
None were reported in Mpumalanga and the Western Cape.
Mvusi said the department was assessing old data — specimens taken from TB patients over the last couple of years — to try to identify other people who may be infected with XDR-TB. Health officials will then try to trace those people.
XDR-TB is defined by the World Health Organisation as TB that is resistant to the main first-line TB drugs and to three or more of the six second-line drugs.
XDR-TB was first identified in South Africa in Tugela Ferry in KwaZulu-Natal earlier this year and showed high mortality rates, with 52 of the first 53 patients dying. The disease is complicated by the presence of HIV/Aids. — Sapa