Equatorial Guinea, a multidrug-resistant tuberculosis hotspot in Central Africa

The national tuberculosis programme (NTP) of Cameroon has recently reported that an alarming number of tuberculosis (TB) patients are border-crossing from neighboring Equatorial Guinea to seek multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) treatment [1, 2]. The World Health Organization (WHO) African Region is reported to bear a low MDR-TB proportion of new tuberculosis cases (2.1%) compared with other WHO regions [3]. Nonetheless, there are big differences between African countries, and data on MDR-TB burden are still lacking from almost half of them. Some could hide true MDR-TB hotspots, brought about by weak diagnostic and control capacities and fueled by health and social factors of vulnerability [4, 5].