Poverty and the Emergence of Tuberculosis: An Agent-Based Modelling Approach

Tuberculosis has been observed to thrive in conditions of poverty and there has been a long history of documented linkage between tuberculosis and poverty at the society and community level. This paper utilizes an agent-based model to incorporate three aspects of the conditions faced by the economically poorer and vulnerable individuals. The three aspects considered in the paper include undernutrition, poor living conditions (overcrowding, inadequate ventilation) and access to adequate health care facilities. The paper aims to understand the effects of poor living conditions on the emergence of latent tuberculosis infection among individuals exposed to the disease. Also, we consider the effect of undernutrition on the immune system response to control the progression from the latent tuberculosis infection to the active tuberculosis disease. Finally, the paper studies the effect on adequate access to proper health care as a factor on the emergence of tuberculosis. The results obtained indicate that malnutrition coupled with limited access to adequate health care increases the risk of emergence of the active tuberculosis disease and also that inadequate ventilation increases the risk of emergence of the latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI).