Abstract:
Tuberculosis (TB) is a major problem in poor countries because sensitive diagnostic tools are unavail-
able. In 2014, our pouched rats evaluated sputum from 21,600 Tanzanians and 9,048 Mozambicans
whose sputum had previously been evaluated by microscopy, the standard diagnostic for TB. Evalua-
tion by the rats revealed 1,412 new patients with active TB in Tanzania and 645 new patients in
Mozambique, increases of 39% and 53%, respectively, when compared to detections by microscopy
alone. These results provide further support for the applied use of scent-detecting rats.
