AN East Lancashire tuberculosis expert’s 10-year analysis of local cases has found that the disease rarely transfers between ethnic groups.

TB is a common, and in some cases lethal, infectious disease, that usually attacks the lungs.

For more than 40 years, East Lancashire has seen high rates of TB in comparison to other UK areas.

Professor Peter Ormerod, associate director for research and development at East Lancashire Hospitals, led work to identify the DNA fingerprints of particular TB strains affecting every East Lancashire patient diagnosed between 2001 and 2009.

The study, now published in the medical journal, Thorax, showed there was very little transmission between clusters of the disease in South Asian ethnic groups and those in white British ethnic groups.

It contradicts claims by some that the disease has become more prevalent in the white population as a result of immigration from the Indian subcontinent.

The study will provide further epidemiological evidence for the national treatment and prevention of TB.

Professor Ormerod said: “The study showed there was significant person-to-person transmission, particularly in the white population.

“Heavy drinking has long been identified as a risk factor for TB, and a number of the clusters studied which affected white people were linked to pubs.

“Another cluster was linked to a group of drug and alcohol users.

"South East Asia has a very high incidence of TB and has no vaccination programme, so it is no surprise that the disease is more prevalent in people from this part of the world.

“Epidemiological and genetic profile links suggest some recent transmission between members of the South Asian community, but most seem to be more isolated cases.

“The genetic fingerprinting classified cases into clusters of infection, and out of 48 clusters, only nine showed any suggestion at all that there had been inter-racial transmission.”