Paediatric tuberculosis in Queensland, Australia: overrepresentation of cross-border and Indigenous children

Queensland, Australia.

Understanding paediatric tuberculosis (TB) is important, as children with TB typically reflect recent community transmission. Children pose unique diagnostic challenges and are at risk of developing severe disseminated infection.

To describe the epidemiology, presentation and outcomes of children with TB disease in Queensland.

This is a retrospective case series of children diagnosed with TB aged 0-16 years notified in 2005-2014. Data collected in the Queensland Notifiable Conditions System were extracted and analysed.

Of 127 children diagnosed with TB, 16 were Australian-born (including 12 Indigenous Queenslanders), 41 were overseas-born permanent and temporary residents and 70 were cross-border Papua New Guinea (PNG) children; 88 children had pulmonary disease (with/without other sites) and 39 had extra-pulmonary disease only, with lymph node TB the predominant extra-pulmonary site; 70.1% of children had laboratory confirmation; and 14 cross-border children had multidrug-resistant TB. Treatment outcomes among children residing in Australia were good (100% among Australian-born and 97.2% among permanent and temporary residents), but they were less favourable among PNG children diagnosed in the Torres Strait Protected Zone (76.6%).

Queensland has unique challenges in TB control, with a high proportion of cross-border diagnoses and over-representation of Indigenous children. Vigilance is needed given the wide spectrum of clinical presentation, particularly in high-risk communities.