Roentgenological studies of lung disease due to mycobacteria other than tubercle bacilli. The second report: on the course of the progression of pulmonary lesions in the fatal cases [English abstract]. Kekkaku

The incidence of lung disease due to mycobacteria other than Mycobacterium tuber-culosis (atypical mycobacteria) in Japan was estimated to be 0.9-1.9 per lOS population per year in 1971-1979. Although the incidence of lung tuberculosis is steadily decreasing, the incidence of lung disease due to atypical mycobacteria has remained at almost the same level. The number of patients newly infected per year in recent years was calculated to be 1'\.12,000. The ratio of the number of patients with lung disease due to atypical mycobacteria to the number of patients with lung disease due to all species of mycobacteria was highest in hospitals on the southwest coast of the Pacific. The atypical mycobacteria that caused disease most frequently belonged to the Mycobacterium avium-intracellulare complex. Of the 537 cases of disease due to atypical mycobacteria, 491 (89.6070) were due to these organisms; 43 (8.0%), to Mycobacterium kansasii; and 7 (1.3%), to Mycobacterium fortuitum. The disease due to M. kansasii appeared most frequently in hospitals in the Tokyo and Kanagawa prefectures. Patients with lung tuberculosis had a high risk of lung infection due to M. avium-intracellulare. The in-cidence of such disease in tuberculous patients was estimated to be 18.7 per 105 popula-tion per year, a rate that is 1'\.110 times that found in the general population. The Mycobacteriosis Research Group of th