Tuberculosis inequalities and socio-economic deprivation in Portugal

OBJECTIVE: To analyse the geographical distribution of tuberculosis (TB) in Portugal and estimate the association between TB and socio-economic deprivation. METHODS: An ecological study at the municipality level using TB notifications for 2010–2014 was conducted. Spatial Bayesian models were used to calculate smoothed standardised notification rates, identify high- and low-risk areas and estimate the association between TB notification and the European Deprivation Index (EDI) for Portugal and its component variables. RESULTS: Standardised notification rates ranged from 4.41 to 76.44 notifications per 100 000 population. Forty-one high-risk and 156 low-risk municipalities were identified. There was no statistically significant association between TB notification rate and the EDI, but some of its variables, such as the proportion of manual workers and the percentage unemployed, were significantly and directly associated with TB notification, whereas the variable ‘proportion of residents with low education level' showed an inverse relationship. CONCLUSION: Wide inequalities in TB notification rates were observed, and some areas continued to exhibit high TB notification rates. We found significant associations between TB and some socio-economic factors of the EDI.This work was supported by contributions from Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway through the European Economic Area Grants, under the Public Health Initiatives Programme (PT 06, grant number 138DT1)