Countries With the Most Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis 2024

What this chart shows. The 25 countries with the most new cases of multidrug- or rifampicin-resistant tuberculosis (MDR/RR-TB) in 2024. India had 130,000, 33.3% of the world's 390,000. China and the Philippines followed with 28,000 each, and Indonesia and Russia with 26,000 each.

How the data is collected. Rifampicin is the most effective first-line tuberculosis drug, and resistance to it makes treatment longer, costlier and less likely to succeed. WHO estimates new MDR/RR-TB cases by applying the resistance levels found in drug-resistance surveys and routine testing to each country's estimated number of cases.

Background. Drug resistance is most common in the former Soviet Union: 6 of the 25 countries were part of it, and in Russia 53.1% of all new cases were drug-resistant, against 3.6% worldwide. Kazakhstan (39.1%) and Ukraine (29.4%) also had very high shares. Globally, new MDR/RR-TB cases fell from 590,000 in 2015 to 390,000.

Limits. Resistance surveys are not repeated every year in every country, so many estimates rest on data that are several years old and carry wide ranges; India's runs from 100,000 to 150,000. Bangladesh, Thailand and Nepal are tied at 2,400. The chart counts new cases of resistant disease, not the number of people who started treatment for it.