Testing Health Workers At Risk to Advance Our Understanding of TB Infection

It has been estimated that 1.7 billion people have tuberculosis (TB) infection; yet current tests are unable to predict which people are at highest risk of developing TB disease, which can be life-threatening. THWART-TB is a prospective longitudinal cohort study of health workers (HWs) in Cape Town, South Africa, where our preliminary data reveals HWs have a high annual TB infection risk (34%). This cohort, who will undergo frequent serial evaluation (every 3 months) with a combination of novel assays never previously evaluated together, presents a unique opportunity to evaluate immune responses at the time of initial infection and to characterize the dynamic profile of these immune responses over time in a high-risk population. The knowledge generated will improve our understanding of TB infection and help to identify which people exposed to TB may remain at risk, enabling us to better target preventive strategies.