The editorial on 'Tuberculosis control in India: Time to get dangerously ambitious?' correctly points out the widespread unjustified use of immunological tests for tuberculosis.' While the sputum smear is the gold standard for diagnosing tuberculosis, there are a number of patients of sputum smear-negative/bronchoscopic aspirate-negative/ biopsy-negative non-resolving pneumonias and lymphadenopathy in day-to-day practice. Many of them eventually respond to antitubercular therapy, which they receive in the absence of a confirmatory test for tuberculosis. It is usually in such patients that a clinician tries to gather as much corroborative evidence as possible to start antitubercular therapy. Though not scientifically justifiable, the use of non-specific tests such as QuantiFERON-TB Gold may not be completely inexplicable.
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