[Analyzing the drug resistance of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Russia's experimental areas introducing the WHO tuberculosis control programme].

The authentic data on the drug resistance of Mycobacterium tuberculosis can be obtained only provided that standard laboratory procedures and the unified standardized method for determining the resistance are used along with a compulsory outside quality control over the performance of this test. The supervisory activities of the researchers of the Central Research Institute of Tuberculosis (CRIT), Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, made in some regions of Russia included standardization of methods and their implementation quality control allowed them to reveal and to correct main errors in drug resistance testing. In this connection, this made it to record the true level of M. tuberculosis resistance to essential antituberculous agents in the areas investigated by the researchers of CRIT. Analyzing the data on the drug resistance of M. tuberculosis in the above areas leads to the conclusion that 2000 was marked by rather high rates of primary drug resistance; nearly a fourth of all new and prior cases of pulmonary tuberculosis studied for its drug resistance were carriers of a M. tuberculosis resistant to at least one antituberculous agent.