26/03/2009 (Agence Europe) - On World Tuberculosis Day, Tuesday 24 March 2009, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) published new information about the disease. There were 477,327 recorded cases of tuberculosis (TB) in the EU in 2007, the equivalent of 55 cases being diagnosed every hour. Most cases in the EU are found in a number of countries - the three Baltic States, Cyprus, Portugal, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Belgium, Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic. The European Commission has announced some promising laboratory tests of a new treatment that might be able to treat multi-resistant strains of TB within the next decade. The results still need to be confirmed. They arose from a research project granted €11 million in funding from the EU's Framework Programme involving researchers from 14 countries. Further information about the research can be found at: http: //http://www.nm4tb.org (O.J.)