After COVID-19, India tries to get into tuberculosis

In this photo, taken March 22, 2022, healthcare workers are working in the drug storage area of ​​Doctors Without Borders (MSF) Clinic in Mumbai. AFP

Mumbai — It is estimated that millions of people died when Covid-19 struck India in 2020-21. Desperate efforts to stop the pandemic have hurt the fight against another giant murderer, tuberculosis.

India is home to a quarter of the world’s tuberculosis infections, with an estimated 500,000 people dying from treatable lung disease in 2020 in South Asian countries. This is one-third of the world’s victims.

According to the World Health Organization, due to the pandemic, the global death toll from “silent killer” increased for the first time in more than 10 years in 2020, reversing long-standing progress.

In India, the number of new cases detected in 2020 actually fell by a quarter to about 1.8 million due to resource diversion due to Covid restrictions and pandemics.

Nearly two-thirds of people with tuberculosis did not seek treatment, according to a 2019-21 national government survey released Thursday on World Tuberculosis Day.

Ashna Ashesh, 29, who was diagnosed with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis four years ago, struggled for help after seeing many patients isolated and unemployed due to a blockade.

“They were incredibly afraid … they wanted all sorts of information they could provide about how to access tests and medications,” said Survivors Against TB Collective Public Health Specialist. The house told AFP.

“The impact is immeasurable … Covid has significantly set back the fight against tuberculosis. Both India and the world, tuberculosis recovery plans are very important.”

India is currently facing a difficult battle to reach Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s goal of ending the TB epidemic by 2025, five years ahead of the UN goal.

Experts and survivors are seeking “missing” cases to combat malnutrition, the main trigger for tuberculosis, and an intensive grassroots campaign to find more vaccine funding and support.

United Nations Kuldeep Singh Sachdeva for tuberculosis and lung disease said the state needs to increase services such as home-to-home visits and mass screening.

“This is the only way to get rid of tuberculosis,” Sakudeva, who previously led the government’s national tuberculosis eradication program, told AFP.

Silver lining

Officially, Covid killed about 520,000 Indians, but experts believe the real casualties are much higher.

However, the pandemic that Covid replaced tuberculosis as the most deadly infectious disease in the world had one silver lining. It’s an increase in mask wear.

Sachdeva estimates that this could have reduced tuberculosis infections by 20%. He added that additional diagnostic machines procured for Covid could be redeployed for tuberculosis.

Mumbai, a tuberculosis hotspot in a metropolitan city of 20 million people, is rolling out a drug-based follow-up program for young survivors such as Seema Kunchikorve, who was diagnosed with tuberculosis five years ago at the age of 20. Did.

“This treatment has many (side-effects) benefits that patients don’t receive,” Kunchkab told AFP in a tuberculosis awareness drama at a school in Dharavi, India’s largest slum.

Vijay Chavan, who treats patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis at Mumbai’s Doctors Without Borders (MSF) clinic, said the Covid fight showed how to fight an old pandemic.

At clinics treating children up to the age of 5, patients undergo hours of health examinations next to brightly colored wallpapers with famous cartoon characters before collecting large trays for treatment. ..

“If you have a political will for tuberculosis like Covid, it will definitely bring us good results,” he told AFP.

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