[Tuberculosis in children and adolescents as a social problem].

Under the conditions of society's socioeconomic instability and increased migratory processes, ever increasing numbers of children and adolescents are being brought up in socially disadapted families. The social status of a family largely determines the infection and morbidity rates of tuberculosis and affects the diagnosis, course and prognosis of the disease in children and adolescents. The infection rates in this group of children are 2-5 times higher than those of children in Russia, the risk of primary infection is 10.9%. In children and adolescents from the socially disadapted families, there was a torpid and undulating course in 50% of cases, 25% being found to have primary resistance to antituberculous drugs, which corresponds to that in the source of infection. To enhance the efficiency of antituberculous diagnostic and therapeutic measures among children and adolescents from socially disadapted population groups, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, public educational institutions, and the general therapeutical network should jointly make a complex of measures within the framework of a goal-oriented sponsored programme.