Consolidated Guidelines

The TB/HIV guidelines summarize the recommendations and related evidence on interventions to reduce the burden of TB among people living with HIV and on interventions to reduce the burden of HIV among people with presumed or diagnosed TB, updating the recommendations outlined within objectives B and C from the TB/HIV policy as depicted in Fig. 1.

Since the WHO policy on collaborative TB/HIV activities (10) was published in 2012, there have been remarkable scientific advances and consequently, updated WHO recommendations on screening, diagnosis, treatment and prevention of HIV-associated TB. These include:

People living with HIV are about 14 times more likely to develop TB disease, have poorer TB treatment outcomes and have more than two-fold higher mortality during TB treatment, compared to all people diagnosed with TB (1).

People living with HIV are about 14 times more likely to develop TB disease, have poorer treatment outcomes and more than two-fold higher mortality during TB treatment, compared to all people diagnosed with TB (1). Addressing HIV-associated TB through integrated patient-centred care and prevention is a key component of the WHO End TB strategy (3).

Note: The definitions listed below apply to the terms as used in these guidelines. They may have different meanings in other contexts.

Adolescent: a person aged 10–19 years.

Adult: a person over 19 years of age.

The production and writing of the WHO consolidated guidelines on tuberculosis. Module 6: TB and comorbidities were coordinated by Annabel Baddeley, Anna Carlqvist and Kerri Viney, under the guidance of Farai Mavhunga and overall direction of Tereza Kasaeva, Director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Global Tuberculosis Programme.

Globally, tuberculosis (TB) remains a significant cause of ill health and is a leading cause of death due to an infectious agent (1). Five main health-related risk factors – diabetes mellitus (diabetes), HIV, smoking, undernutrition and disorders due to alcohol use – account collectively for just under half of all new TB episodes globally. The contribution of these risk factors to the global TB burden is reported annually in the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) global tuberculosis report (1).