Risk of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection in Somalia: national tuberculin survey 2006

To estimate the annual risk of tuberculosis [TB] infection [ARTI] in Somalia a tuberculin survey was conducted in February/March 2006. Stratified cluster sampling was carried out within the 18 regions and 101 randomly selected primary schools. Tuberculin testing was done in 10 680 grade 1 schoolchildren. Transverse tuberculin reaction size was measured 72 hours later. The number of children with a satisfactory test read was 10 364. The overall BCG coverage was 54%. Based on frequency distribution of tuberculin reaction sizes, the ARTI in Somalia was estimated at 2.2% [confidence interval: 1.5%-3.2%]. There was an annual decline of 2.6% comparing with a previous study in 1956