Death and disability: the outcomes of tuberculous meningitis

The most feared consequence of infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis in infants and young children is tuberculous meningitis. In the 1930s, researchers established that infants and young children are particularly susceptible to tuberculous meningitis, and that it is the major cause of tuberculosis-related childhood death (1, 2). The numbers of deaths due to tuberculous meningitis worldwide each year are unknown because of difficulties in diagnosis and under-reporting of tuberculosis in children, especially when infection causes early death. However, tuberculous meningitis is probably a major contributor to the estimated 200 or more child deaths every day due to tuberculosis worldwide (3). Furthermore, as other common causes of meningitis in infants and children become less common with the rollout of effective bacterial conjugate vaccines, M tuberculosis becomes relatively more important as a preventable and treatable pathogen causing death and disability due to bacterial meningitis in children (4—6).