Tuberculosis (tb) is affecting thousands of people in South Africa. Last year, nearly 140,000 people contracted the disease, according to World Health Organization ( who) and South African officials. South Africa has the world's highest incidence of tb and multidrug resistant tb, which kills 80 per cent of those who become sick, said who consultant Donald Enarson. The infection rate in this country stood at 311 cases per 100,000 people, which is more than double the rates in neighbouring Mozambique and Tanzania.

The wide incidence of aids which attacks the human immune system in the country is one of the reasons why tb has spread quickly in South Africa. "In many ways, the multidrug resistant tuberculosis is much more frightening than aids . There is virtually nothing you can do to protect yourself from tb,' said Enarson. A person is at risk of falling sick and dying if he or she breathes in drug resistant strains of tb, which are spread by coughing or sneezing. Health officials are currently testing a relatively new tb strategy developed in Tanzania, which involves health workers monitoring the daily doses of anti-tb medication taken by each patient.