Douglas JT, Qian L, Guo W, Chien H, Yu M, Ping T; American Society for Microbiology. General Meeting.

Abstr Gen Meet Am Soc Microbiol. 1999 May 30-Jun 3; 99: 438 (abstract no. L/U-17).

University of Hawaii, Honolulu.

It is now possible to track the movement of M. tuberculosis within countries and across borders using molecular typing techniques. Our interest in the origin of strains coming into Hawaii has led us to examine the distribution of M. tuberculosis in Asia. In this study we concentrated isolates found in Taiwan. Two sets of M. tuberculosis, for a total of 114 isolates, from pulmonary tuberculosis patients (mean age = 55 years) were provided by the Taiwan Provincial Chronic Disease Control Bureau. The first set of 40 isolates were collected in 1997 and a second set of 74 in 1998. These isolates came from at least 15 different districts with Taipei County accounting for at least 38 isolates. The area of residence was not available for 34 isolates. Spoli- gotyping patterns were used to compare the isolates. The predominant spoligotyping pattern found in isolates from Taiwan was the Beijing family, 54% (62/114). These came from at least nine different areas in Taiwan. The remaining 52 non-Beijing family isolates coming from 13 areas were placed in nine groups containing 39 isolates and a second aggregate containing 22, which could not be matched to other isolates. Three groups appear to be unique to Taiwan and could not be matched to isolates from Hawaii or Mainland China. One group of three isolates belonged to the Manila family and another group of six was associated with isolates found in Hawaii. The remaining four groups containing seven isolates were linked to patterns from Mainland China. We also found that the Beijing Family in Taiwan had a higher rate of drug resistance 44%(17/38) then non-Beijing family types of 21% (7/32). The difference was significant (p < 0.05). This finding was interesting, since the spoligotyping pattern of Beijing family is the same as the pattern for the W-family, which is known to be associated with drug resistance. This study demonstrates the ability to map the frequency occurrence of families M. tuberculosis associated with different areas and provides useful epidemiological infor- mation on the distribution of the organism. We have shown linkage of families in Taiwan to Mainland China, Hawaii and the Philippines. Together with other studies, we have demon- strated that the distribution of the families of isolates as measured by frequency of occurrence varies with geographical location. Changes of occurrence of spoligotype patterns within a geographical area could be used to signal emergence of more virulent strains or a need for improved control programs.

Publication Types:

• Meeting Abstracts

Keywords:

• Asia
• Case-Control Studies
• China
• Hawaii
• Humans
• Philippines
• Taiwan
• Tuberculosis
• Tuberculosis, Pulmonary

Other ID:

• 20712197

UI: 102195727

From Meeting Abstracts