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Rebecca Voelker
JAMA contributor

JAMA. 1998;280:1216.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Three nongovernmental organizations have called for a worldwide effort to fight the spread of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) in Russia.

In a statement issued last month, the relief groups Doctors Without Borders and the Medical Emergency Relief Network International, along with the Public Health Research Institute (PHRI), a nonprofit biomedical research organization, said the number of MDR-TB cases has reached alarming levels. Invoking the name of a deadly African disease, they described the spread of MDR-TB in Russia as "Ebola with wings."

The joint statement said the country's economic crisis will only worsen the problem if patients' anti-TB therapy is interrupted, resulting in increased drug resistance. The organizations called particular attention to health conditions in Russian prisons, where they estimated that 20000 inmates may have MDR-TB. With support from a project funded by US philanthropist George Soros, representatives from PHRI toured prisons in two Russian cities last month.

The . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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