Background The prevalence of infectious diseases such as tuberculosis (TB), HIV and hepatitis B in the UK asylum seeker and refugee population is currently uncertain. Methods Systematic review of published and unpublished studies. Results Five studies met the inclusion criteria. Three studies reported the prevalence of TB with rates ranging from 1.33 to 10.42 per 1000. The three studies reporting hepatitis B estimated rates from 57 to 118 per 1000. One study reported a prevalence rate for HIV of 38.19 per 1000. Conclusion A small number of studies have been identified reporting prevalence rates for TB, hepatitis B and HIV that vary widely where comparisons are available. These differences may reflect true variation in risk between study populations, but are likely to be affected by sampling difficulties encountered when researching these population groups. Efforts are required to improve these difficulties which are currently limiting the validity of prevalence findings and generalizability to comparable asylum seeker and refugee populations.

Asylum seekers tuberculosis Refugees HIV Hepatitis B Immigration

HIV Infections refugee Human immunodeficiency virus infection human Communicable Diseases Refugees statistics Great Britain Cross-Sectional Studies Humans cross-sectional study classification tuberculosis reproducibility Reproducibility of Results Article communicable disease United Kingdom hepatitis B