WHO: TB spreading in Africa

GENEVA, Switzerland, March 24 (UPI) -- The World Health Organization said Thursday the fight against tuberculosis in Africa is being lost.

The group's Global Tuberculosis Control report for 2005 says global TB prevalence has declined by more than 20 percent since 1990 and incidence rates are now falling or stable in five of the six regions of the world.

But the glaring exception is Africa, where TB incidence rates have tripled since 1990 in countries with high rates of human immunodeficiency virus infection and are still rising across the continent at a rate of 3 percent to 4 percent annually.

Even Uganda, where progress against HIV infection has been good, is seeing fewer TB cures today than it did four years ago, the WHO said.