Deaths Because Of TB Also Increased During The Covid Epidemic, Reveals WHO Report

According to the UN Health Agency, in the year 2021, an estimated 16 million people worldwide were affected by TB, which was a 4.5 percent increase compared to the year 2020 and TB killed about 1.6 million people, including one lakh 87 thousand patients. He was also suffering from HIV infection.
Drug resistant TB (DR-TB) also saw an increase of three percent during this period. Also, about 4.5 lakh new cases of antibiotic rifampicin-resistant TB (RR-TB) were reported. This is the first time in many years that the number of people infected with TB has increased.

lessons from the pandemic

World Health Organization Director-General Dr Tedros Adenholm Ghebreyesus said that if the pandemic has taught us anything, it is that with solidarity, determination, innovation and equitable use of tools, we can overcome even serious health risks. Let us apply this experience to TB as well. Now is the right time to put a complete stop to this deadly disease which has been going on for a long time. He said that by working together in solidarity, we can end TB.

Significantly, tuberculosis (TB) is the infectious disease responsible for the highest number of deaths in the world, after the COVID-19 pandemic. It is spread by a bacteria that most commonly affects the lungs. But it is preventable and can also be treated. All health services were severely affected during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the impact had a particularly wide-ranging impact on health services combating TB. The situation has been worsened by ongoing conflicts in Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

Lack of diagnosis and treatment of disease

According to the latest global TB report, there has been a decline in new cases of its infection. Which were 71 lakhs in the year 2019, but in 2020 their number decreased to 58 lakhs. However, there was a partial improvement during the year 2021 and the number of new infection cases stood at 64 lakhs. This was still lower than the level before the start of the Kovid-19 pandemic. The World Health Organization (WHO) says that these reductions suggest that the number of people affected by TB infection and being denied treatment has increased. As a result, the number of deaths due to TB has increased. Along with this, there has also been an increase in the spread of infection at the community level. As a result more people are getting infected with this disease. Global funding on essential services that combat TB is also shrinking. This amount was $ 6 billion in the year 2019 which came down to 5.4 billion in the year 2021.

urgent measures needed

In the midst of this stalled progress, there is some good news and some progress has been documented in the report. Globally, during 2018 and 2022, 206.3 million TB patients were treated. However, this number was much less than the target of 4 crores set for these four years. The report also underscores the need for countries to take urgent measures to restore the availability of effective health services necessary to combat TB. The report also calls for increased resource investment and action to address the larger factors affecting the TB epidemic. It also underscores the importance of the need for new diagnostics, drugs and vaccines. The WHO will convene a high-level summit in early 2023 to take lessons from the coronavirus pandemic and speed up vaccine development.