Epidemiological Study of Prevalence TB in Iraq

Abstract

To assess the prevalence of tuberculosis epidemic in Iraq in terms of the age groups most affected by tuberculosis bacteria, for both gender and for all governorates of Iraq, various clinical specimens were obtained from 744 patients attending the Specialized Chest and Respiratory Disease Center / National Reference Laboratory (NRL) for tuberculosis in Baghdad between April 15 and November 14 2021 the diagnosis by direct microscopy using the Zeihl-Nelsen (ZN) stain and followed by culturing on Lowenstein-Jensen medium (LJ), for 744 clinical specimens revealed that 92(12.37%) specimens were positive by direct examination while 111(14.9%) specimens were positive by culturing on LJ medium with sputum specimens accounting for the majority of culture positive specimens 103/111(92.8%) the rate of Pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) was a higher than (EPTB) extra-pulmonary (94.6%), (5.4%) respectively the most of tuberculosis cases were found in Baghdad city (62.2%) vs other governorates (37.8%) males were more affected (63.0%) than females (37.0%) and the majority of patients were aged 35–44 years (30.6%) but the lowest age group was least than 15 years (1.8%) the data above ** (P≤0.01) showed a statistically significant difference, cultivation dependence most be more sensitive than direct method and require more attention in TB control programs to healing patients. Keywords: Tuberculosis; Mycobacterium tuberculosis; Iraq.