CRP and tuberculosis: As expected, compared with HHC, active TB cases had significantly higher median plasma levels of CRP (32.7 vs. 1.6 ng/ml, p<0.0001), IL-6 (7.44 vs. 0 pg/ml, p = 0.0005) and TNF-α (14.19 vs. 9.15 pg/ml, p<0.0001) (Fig 1B–1D).