During 2021, it was estimated that there were approximately 4.2 million cases of tuberculosis that were never diagnosed or reported worldwide. A large part of the new disease cases are found in countries with limited healthcare infrastructure. The need for tests that can be performed with simple equipment and do not require much training to handle is therefore great.
The disease tuberculosis is caused by a bacterium and primarily affects the lungs. Those infected can become seriously ill, but those who are treated usually become completely healthy again.
Takes an hour to detect
A new type of test has been created, called "labb-i-tub". It costs three dollars (equivalent to 30 kronor) per test and only takes an hour to detect the bacterium in either blood or respiratory samples.
Fredrik Almqvist is a professor at the Department of Chemistry at Umeå University and researches new ways to combat tuberculosis. He is positively inclined towards the study.
You get happy when you see this type of study that looks promising for getting a more effective and good diagnosis for tuberculosis. The earlier you can detect the infection, the greater the chance of getting better treatment, he says.
If you don't even have good opportunities to detect tuberculosis, to diagnose it, then treatment is not initiated and then tuberculosis will spread, of course, since it is an airborne infection.
Tested in the Dominican Republic
27 children in the Dominican Republic have tested the "labb-i-tub" test, according to the study published in Science Translational Medicine. They have also examined samples from a total of 66 adults. To get greater security in the results, studies need to be done with a larger base, but so far it looks promising, according to Fredrik Almqvist.
The data is robust and you have to have respect for the fact that it is published in such a good journal, he says.
But it's clear that it's a basic scientific article that suggests that this could be possible.
The test has, according to the study, a sensitivity of 81 percent and an accuracy of 94 percent. Thus, it meets WHO's standard for new tuberculosis diagnostics.
