China lacks a nationwide clinical guideline for tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis and treatment, which might affect the intervention efforts to stem the infectious disease's spread, TB specialists and health officials say.

They say the disease hits at least 120,000 people on the mainland a year, accounting for 25 percent of the world's total. The information was released at the 2012 Public Health Day organized by Tsinghua University and Xi'an-Janssen Pharmaceutical Ltd.

Currently, the diagnosis and treatment coverage of multi-drug-resistant TB is less than 30 percent on the mainland, the Ministry of Health reports.

China Daily-Agencies