The Northern Territory Disease Control Bulletin
Disease Control Bulletin
Territory Health Services, Centre for Disease Control
Northern Territory disease control bulletin; E-Journals; PublicationNT; Northern Territory disease control bulletin
2002-03
Casuarina
Date:2002-03; This publication contains may contain links to external sites. These external sites may no longer be active.; Made available via the Publications (Legal Deposit) Act 2004 (NT).
English
Communicable diseases; Reporting; Northern Territory; Statistics; Periodicals
Northern Territory Government
Casuarina
Northern Territory disease control bulletin
v. 9 no. 1
application/pdf
1440-883X
Attribution International 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)
Northern Territory Government
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/233806
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/655675
The Northern Territory Disease Control Bulletin Vol 9, No.1, March 2002 7 a According to the ABS 1996 census figures, 46.1% of children aged 10-14 years would have been the target group. This proportion was applied to future ABS estimates of the yearly cohort to calculate the denominator in subsequent years. Results Target population and number screened Using ABS figures, the target population for each year increased from 2,772 in 1991 to 3,032 in 1996 and from 1,412 in 1997 to 1,460 in 2000. There were 14,794 students between the ages of 9 and 16 screened in the years 19912000. Figure 1 illustrates the number screened in each population group and Figure 2 highlights the proportion of the target population screened. The change in policy in 1997 to exclude nonAboriginal Australian born students unless they lived in an Aboriginal community can be seen in the figures. However, the proportion of the target population which underwent screening also fell with 69.4% of the target population screened before 1997 compared to 40.4% from 1997 to 2000, though the trend over the past 3 years has been upward. Figure 1 The number of students screened per year, by population group, 1991-2000 Figure 2 Proportion of the target group screened, 1991 - 2000 Mantoux positivity Figure 3 illustrates the proportion of students who were Mantoux positive in each group, with the non-Aboriginal Australian born group divided into before and after 1997. The group of non-Aboriginal Australian born students tested post 1996 comprised only 76 students (6 positive). The prevalence of positive Mantoux reactions in the screened population prior to 1997 was 3.9% and from 1997 onwards was 5.0% (RR = 1.26, 95% CI; 1.03-1.54, p=0.02). The prevalence of positive Mantoux reactions in each of the population groups per year is illustrated in Figure 4. Figure 3 Proportion of children Mantoux positive, by population group, 1991-2000 Figure 4 The proportion of children who were Mantoux positive, by year and population group, 1991-2000 0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 Year N u m b er o f st u d en ts Aboriginal Australian born Non-Aboriginal Overseas born Policy change 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 Year P er ce n t (% ) Changed policy to focus on those most at risk with the appropriate change in denominator 5.2 9.4 2.4 7.9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Aboriginal Overseas born Aust born non-Abor screened 91 96 Aust born non-Abor screened 97 00* P er ce n t (% ) * Non-Aboriginal students living in Aboriginal communities. 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 19 91 19 92 19 93 19 94 19 95 19 96 19 97 19 98 19 99 20 00 Year P er ce n t (% ) Overseas born Aboriginal Australian born Non-Aboriginal