Tuberculosis screening yield of asylum seekers in Europe

With interest we read the research letter by de Vries et al . [1] describing the yield of screening asylum seekers from countries with a tuberculosis (TB) incidence of <50 per 100 000 population. Over an almost 4-year period (2011–September 2015), the Dutch TB prevention programme diagnosed 12 TB patients from these countries through active screening (including eight Syrians). The authors concluded the yield of this screening was low and could therefore be discontinued. In high income, low incidence countries foreign-born cases contribute significantly to TB epidemiology [2], while elimination was set as the objective [3]. Yield of tuberculosis entry screening of Syrian refugees in Belgium, 2015: migration is not a public health threat