“Genetic diversity of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex in treatment naive sputum smear positive patients as revealed by spoligotyping and MIRU-VNTR.”

The finding of half of the strains resistant to one or more anti-tuberculosis drugs and 12.5 % MDR strains emphasizes the importance of susceptibility testing before initiation of treatment.EAI lineage is considered to be predominant in Southern part of India which was corroborated in our study. MIRU-VNTR should be used in addition to spoligotyping since it has got finer discriminatory power. Molecular epidemiological studies should be performed periodically to assess the circulating strains in a particular geographic area.