Despite the availability of curative therapy, a large proportion of patients with TB are being hospitalized. Inhospital mortality rates remain high, particularly among patients with TB requiring intensive care unit (ICU) admission. These cases represent 1-3% of all patients with TB [3] . Acute respiratory failure (ARF) caused by TB necessitating mechanical ventilation (MV) has been associated with mortality rates between 25.9% and 81% [3] [4] [5] [6] . Furthermore, such patients have a prognosis significantly worse than patients with nontuberculous pneumonia requiring MV [6] .