Highest rate of tuberculosis infection

The country with the highest rate of tuberculosis infection is Lesotho, a small landlocked African nation entirely surrounded by South Africa. According to World Health Organization figures for 2019 (the most recent year available), 654 out of every 100,000 people there are diagnosed with the disease every year.

For comparison the United Kingdom's annual TB incidence rate is 8 per 100,000, and in the United States it is just 3. The country's high rate of tuberculosis is directly related to its similarly high rate of HIV/AIDS infection. HIV/AIDS weakens and eventually destroys the immune system, meaning people with the disease easily succumb to opportunistic respiratory infections like TB. Tuberculosis is the number one killer of people living with HIV.