Tuberculosis associated with the living conditions in an endemic municipality in the North of Brazil*

OBJECTIVE: to analyze the association between the occurrence of new tuberculosis cases and the Adapted Living Condition Index, and to describe the spatial distribution in an endemic municipality. METHOD: this is an analytical and ecological study that was developed from new cases in residents of an endemic municipality in the North Region of Brazil. The data were obtained from the Notifiable Diseases Information System and from the 2010 Demographic Census. The Adapted Living Conditions Index was obtained by factor analysis and its association with the occurrence of the disease was analyzed by means of the chi-square test. The type I error was set at 0.05. Kernel estimation was used to describe the density of tuberculosis in each census sector. RESULTS: the incidence coefficient was 97.5/100,000 inhabitants. The data showed a statistically significant association between the number of cases and socioeconomic class, with the fact that belonging to the highest economic class reduces the chance of the disease occurring. The thematic maps showed that tuberculosis was distributed in a heterogeneous way with a concentration in the Southern region of the municipality. CONCLUSION: tuberculosis, associated with precarious living conditions, reinforces the importance of discussion on social determinants in the health-disease process to subsidize equitable health actions in risk areas, upon a context of vulnerability.