Abstract: In tuberculosis (TB) high-incidence settings, individuals completing TB treatment remain at high risk of recurrent TB. Their elevated risk of TB is due to both relapse and reinfection. Recent studies from southern Africa have shown that previously treated individuals account for a sizable fraction of the overall adult population and of the prevalent infectious TB burden in these settings, suggesting that they may contribute considerably to ongoing transmission. To date, it is not known whether targeted interventions that aim to prevent recurrence or detect and treat recurrent disease promptly can be useful strategies to improve TB control. In this talk, I will provide key insights into past and ongoing field work and demonstrate how both mathematical modeling and traditional epidemiological studies can be used as a tools to inform the development of targeted TB control interventions.

About: Florian Marx is a physician and epidemiologist from Berlin who completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Ted Cohen’s group at the Yale School of Public Health earlier this year and is now based at the Desmond Tutu TB Centre (Department of Paediatrics and Child Health) at Stellenbosch University. Over the past years, Florian has conducted field work in Cape Town to better understand the burden, drivers and temporal dynamics of tuberculosis among previously treated people in high-incidence settings. Together with Ted Cohen’s team, he has developed a transmission-dynamic mathematical model to project the impact of interventions targeted to this particular group. His other research interests include drug-resistant and paediatric TB. Besides his research work, Florian has served WHO as a technical consultant on several occasions where he focused mainly on TB surveillance, monitoring and evaluation.