UNITED NATIONS: Tuberculosis (TB) response is rebounding after disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, but additional efforts are needed to eradicate the disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.
The finding comes in the latest WHO Global Tuberculosis Report which reveals that 7.5 million people were diagnosed with TB in 2022 the highest number since the UN agency initiated global monitoring in 1995.
TB is an infectious disease that primarily affects the lungs. It is caused by a specific bacteria and spreads through the air when infected people cough, sneeze or spit. TB is both preventable and curable.
The surge in TB diagnosis was attributed to good recovery in access to, and provision of, health services in many countries, according to the report, which features data from 192 countries.
India, Philippines and Indonesia are responsible for over 60 per cent of the global reduction in new diagnoses in 2020 and 2021- all recovered to beyond 2019 levels the previous year.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO Director-General, reflected that TB had plagued previous generations for centuries. People suffered and died from the disease without knowing what it was, the cause, or how to combat it.
Today, we have advance knowledge and tools they could only have dreamed of, he said. We have political commitment, and we have an opportunity that no generation in the history of humanity has had: the opportunity to write the final chapter in the story of TB.
Globally, an estimated 10.6 million individuals fell ill with TB in 2022, up from 10.3 million the previous year.
The majority were in the WHO Regions of Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Western Pacific, which together accounted for nearly 90 per cent. Smaller proportions were reported in the Eastern Mediterranean, Europe and America.
The total number of TB-related deaths, including those among people with HIV, stood at 1.3 million in 2022, down from 1.4 million the past year.
Meanwhile, COVID-19 disruptions resulted in nearly half a million more deaths from TB during the period from 2020-2022, and the disease continues to be the leading killer among people with HIV.
Although there is some progress in the development of new TB diagnostics, drugs and vaccines this is constrained by the overall level of investment in these areas, further said WHO.
Global efforts to fight TB have saved over 75 million lives since the year 2000, but action must be stepped up, the agency said, as it remained the world’s second leading infectious killer in 2022, behind COVID-19.
At a meeting held during the High-Level Week of the UN General Assembly in September, the international community strengthened the 2018 commitments and targets and set new ones for the period through 2027.
The new targets include reaching 90 per cent of people in need of TB prevention and healthcare services, using a WHO-recommended rapid test as the first method of diagnosis, providing all patients with a health and social benefits package, ensuring the availability of at least one new safe and effective TB vaccine, and closing funding gaps.
The report further emphasized that ending the global TB epidemic requires translating these commitments into real action. —APP
