Universal Journal of Microbiology Research 3(2): 26-29, 2015 http://www.hrpub.org DOI: 10.13189/ujmr.2015.030203 Prevalence of Human Immunodeficiency Virus in Tuberculosis Positive Patients in General Hospital Onitsha, Nigeria Onuorah Samuel 1,* , Obika Ifeanyi 2 , Orji Michael 1 1 Department of Applied Microbiology and Brewing, Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka, Nigeria 2 Department of Zoology, Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka, Nigeria Copyright © 2015 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License Abstract Tuberculosis (TB) and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) co-infection is a major challenge in tuberculosis prevention and control. The prevalence of HIV in tuberculosis patients aged between 10 and 59 years receiving medical care at General Hospital Onitsha, Nigeria was investigated. Seventy-five of the patients were males while eight-five were females. Their sputum and blood samples were screened for tuberculosis and HIV. The sputum samples were examined by microscopy and culture. Patients between 20 and 29 years of age had the highest number of tuberculosis cases (30.7%) while those aged between 50 and 59 years had the least number of cases (9.4%). Forty-five males (28.1%) and fifty females (31.2%) tested positive to HIV respectively. The prevalence of HIV among the tuberculosis patients was 59.3%. Twenty-eight patients (29.5%) composed of twelve males (12.6%) and sixteen females (16.9%) between 20 and 29 years had TB/HIV while eleven patients (11.6%) comprising six males (6.3%) and five females (5.3%) between 50 and 59 years were co-infected. Acid-fast bacilli were detected by culture in 92 (57.5%) of the tuberculosis patients while they were detected by microscopy in 68 (42.3%) of the patients indicating the higher sensitivity of culture for tuberculosis case detection. Keywords Prevalence, Human Immunodeficiency Virus, Tuberculosis, Patients, General Hospital 1. Introduction Tuberculosis has been reported as the most common respiratory disease that results from the inhalation of air droplets infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, with the highest prevalence of the disease in Sahara Africa and Asia [1]. More than half of these live in countries ravaged by HIV/AIDS [2]. It is the commonest opportunistic infection and the number one cause of death in HIV patients in developing countries and accounts for about 40% of all manifestations seen in HIV patients [3]. About 25% to 65% of patients with HIV/AIDS have tuberculosis of any organ and tuberculosis accounts for about 13% of all HIV related deaths worldwide [4, 5]. Between 1998 and 1999, a 20% increase of tuberculosis case was reported in countries severely affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa [6]. People with HIV are increasingly infected with tuberculosis because HIV weakens their immune system. Autopsy studies have shown disseminated tuberculosis in 14% to 54% of HIV infected people in HIV prevalent countries, many of whom were undiagnosed prior to death [7]. Also, studies among HIV-positive persons attending voluntary counseling and testing and in home-based HIV/AIDS care patients have consistently reported high rates of undiagnosed prevalent tuberculosis [8,9]. Individuals infected with tuberculosis have a higher likelihood of progressing from intent tuberculosis to active tuberculosis if they are co-infected with HIV [10]. Furthermore, tuberculosis may speed the development of HIV infection to AIDS in dually-infected individuals. Tuberculosis and HIV co-morbidity is a relevant public health issue worldwide and does not spare the European region [11-13]. HIV positive individuals infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis are placed at a 20-30 times greater risk of developing active TB [14]. Diagnosis of latent infection and active TB is more challenging in immuno-compromised individuals including people living with HIV [2]. They may present with a typical clinical manifestation of TB or have masked disease with implications on adequate clinical case management [2,15]. The objective of this study was to determine the prevalence of HIV in tuberculosis positive patients in General Hospital Onitsha, Nigeria. The result will assist physicians in the treatment and care of infected persons as