According to the World Health Organization (WHO), Viet Nam ranks 12th among 22 high burden tuberculosis (TB) countries, and 14th among 27 high burden multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) countries in the world. "2.7% of new TB cases, and 19% of previously treated cases have MDR-TB in Viet Nam" said Dr Hoang Thanh Thuy of Viet Nam's national TB Programme (NTP). She was speaking with Citizen News Service – CNS at the 4th Union Asia Pacific Region Conference on Lung Health in Hanoi, Viet Nam. Viet Nam has 3,700 MDR-TB cases annually. Although evidence is weak due to lack of data but people living with HIV (PLHIV) are more likely to get drug-resistant TB, said Dr Thuy basing her observation on higher MDR-TB rates in places where TB-HIV co-infection was reported more in Viet Nam.

One golden wish in TB care and control is surely around early diagnosis of all forms of TB. New rapid diagnostic tools have come on board over the past years such as Liquid Culture, Line Probe Assay (LPA), and Xpert MTB/RIF among others in addition to conventional gold standard solid culture and drug susceptibility testing (DST). At the 4th Union Asia Pacific Region Conference on Lung Health in Hanoi, Viet Nam, national TB programmes of different countries shared their experience of using WHO - recommended Xpert MTB/RIF in Programmatic Management of Drug-resistant TB (PMDT) over the past few years.

The 4th Union Asia Pacific Region Conference on Lung Health (APRC 2013) opened in Hanoi, Viet Nam, with a powerful and thought-provoking session on TB and migrants. There are scores of known structural drivers that put people at risk of TB such as poverty, but other less-spoken factors, such as immigration laws, International relations between countries, legal status of migrants, labour laws, and politics of borders where some countries deport expats who develop TB, need more attention too. According to International Organization for Migration (IOM), there are 215 million international and 740 million internal migrants. Migrants in many parts of the world are known to have reduced access to TB diagnosis and treatment, affecting the global fight against the disease. A range of policy measures have been taken at different levels including global, yet implementation is indeed lacking in most countries. The countries where migrants originate from, as well as the countries receiving migrants, have the responsibility to establish partnerships to ensure continuity of care.