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 8 Mantoux size The Mantoux reading was zero in 82.4% of nonAboriginal Australian born students, 71.3% of Aboriginal students, and 64.7% of overseas born students. The distribution of non-zero Mantoux size in the population groups is illustrated in Figure 5. In the Aboriginal and overseas born groups, a bi-modal pattern can be identified with the second mode at 14mm and 16mm respectively. This pattern is not seen in the nonAboriginal Australian born population. Figure 5 The size of non-zero Mantoux reactions as a proportion of each group, adjusted for digit preference, 1991-2000 Country of birth Countries were categorised as low or high risk for TB based on WHO reported incidence being less than or greater than 50 per 100,000 in the years 1984 to 1991. 11.7% of students who were born in high risk countries were Mantoux positive compared with 4.7% of overseas born students born in low risk countries (RR=2.48; 95%CI; 1.59-3.58;p<0.001). Table 1 summarises the proportion of Mantoux positive students by country of birth. For most of the countries numbers were small and so the individual proportions were difficult to interpret and those numbering less than 5 were excluded. Outcomes Outcome data for 2000 revealed that there were 706 children screened which represented 50.5% of the target group. Thirty-four students were deemed eligible for isoniazid therapy but only 6 (17.6%) completed the course. Reasons for drop out included non-adherence, loss to follow-up (or still awaiting follow-up) while some students were not offered treatment. Thirty-eight students did not have their Mantoux read. Table 1 Proportion of students who were Mantoux positive, by country of birth (excluding Australia)a a The countries in which less than 5 students were born were excluded. 1. Country not specified. Discussion This is the first review of the Mantoux school screening program since 1995, but it still falls far short of a complete evaluation. The major policy change in 1997 which restricted screening in 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 30 Size (mm) P er ce n t (% ) Aboriginal Overseas born Australian born Non-Aboriginal Country Mantoux pos (%) Number screened Singapore 25.0 16 Taiwan 23.1 13 Vietnam 20.9 43 Brunei 16.7 6 Chile 16.7 6 Poland 16.7 6 China 15.4 13 PNG 15.3 72 Czech Rep 14.3 7 Fiji 14.3 14 Philippines 12.8 188 Zimbabwe 12.5 16 Thailand 11.8 51 Africa1 11.1 9 Japan 11.1 9 Germany 10.5 19 USA 9.5 42 Hong Kong 9.3 43 Malaysia 9.3 86 Timor 9.2 65 Portugal 8.7 23 Canada 7.7 13 S Africa 7.7 13 Korea 7.1 14 Indonesia 7.0 57 Sri Lanka 6.1 33