Let us chart strategies for fight against tuberculosis

21Mar 2017
Editor
Editorial
The Guardian
Let us chart strategies for fight against tuberculosis

WORLD TB Day, falling on March 24th each year, is designed to build public awareness that tuberculosis today remains an epidemic in much of the world, causing the deaths of nearly one-and-a-half million people each year, mostly in developing countries.

It commemorates the day in 1882 when Dr Robert Koch astounded the scientific community by announcing that he had discovered the cause of tuberculosis, the TB bacillus.

At the time of Koch's announcement in Berlin, TB was raging through Europe and the Americas, causing the death of one out of every seven people. Koch's discovery opened the way towards diagnosing and curing TB. The theme of this year’s World TB Day is: "Unite to End TB".

On 5th of July, 2013, Tanzania became one of the first five African countries to complete the national Tuberculosis prevalence survey.
.
The progress made so far in tuberculosis control in the country including the use of directly observed treatment short course for tuberculosis, the introduction of fixed dose combination (FDC) and patient centered TB treatment (PCT).

The prevalence of tuberculosis in the country 2013 was 295 smear positive cases per 100,000 compared to 261 cases per 100,000 adults which was projected by the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Disseminating results of the first national tuberculosis prevalence survey in 2013 the Ministry of Health noted that the results showed that TB is still a serious challenge facing the country.
This shows that TB is still a major burden in the country.

Furthermore, results in the survey have shown that TB is more prevalent in males than in females and that the prevalence of HIV infection among TB suspects is 4.8 per cent and among TB patients is 6.5 per cent.

This calls for renewed efforts by all to strengthen the current health delivery system and programme interventions for tuberculosis in Tanzania. In the same vein we appreciate the support availed to the country by development partners in the fight against tuberculosis.
The challenges and lessons learnt from the survey showed that TB burden is still large.

However, the survey results show positive impact of well implemented DOTS services demonstrated by a shift of the epidemic to older populations that we have not yet observed in other African countries. At the same time, we also see a mode among the most economically productive age group (25-34 year olds) suggesting that TB is still circulating in the community.

Moreover, half of those prevalent cases in the community reported chronic cough and more cases were detected in the rural areas where routine case notification is low. Thus, there is need to strengthen basic DOTS services to pick up more of these prevalent but undetected cases.

We should therefore use the results and experiences for better planning and resource mobilization and allocation. Furthermore, we whould encourage further analysis to be done by the NTLP in collaboration with partners to finalise the results and to re-estimate the burden of TB in Tanzania more accurately. We equally commend the WHO’s commitment to continue to avail technical expertise towards TB control in the country.

Top Stories