Why we should move away - not towards - symptom-based terminology and policy in tuberculosis.

Abstract

For over a century, tuberculosis (TB) has referred to the disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis-an infection that can take many forms and exist without symptoms. Recently, WHO introduced the term 'asymptomatic tuberculosis' (aTB) for cases without reported symptoms during screening. While intended to highlight the importance of aTB and limitations of symptom-based screening, this Viewpoint questions whether the term helps or hinders these aims. aTB relies on ill-defined 'symptom report', leading to variable interpretation, misunderstanding, and paradoxically reinforcing symptom-screening. Terminologically splitting TB has also led to aTB being misunderstood as a distinct, milder 'cond..