In a New York Times (12/7) op-ed, columnist Nicholas D. Kristoff
wrote that "XDR-TB, the scariest form of tuberculosis," may "spread
to your neighborhood because it isn't being aggressively addressed
now, before it rages out of control. It's being nurtured by global
complacency." According to Kristoff, "Americans don't think much
about TB, just as we didn't think much of AIDS in the 1980s."
Nevertheless, "drug-resistant TB is spreading -- half a million cases
a year already -- and in a world connected by jet planes and constant
flows of migrants and tourists, the risk is that our myopia will catch
up with us." At present, "one-third of the world's population is infected
with TB, and some 1.5 million people die annually of it." These figures
are higher than malaria deaths "or any infectious disease save AIDS."
Kristoff recommended that "Barack Obama's administration should
ensure it isn't complacent about TB in the way that Ronald Reagan
was about AIDS."