TB SURVEILLANCE MILESTONE (Syllabus: GS Paper 3 – Sci and Tech)

Context: With 25,37,235 TB cases notified in 2023, India has bettered the TB notification number achieved in 2022.

About Tuberculosis (TB)

• About: It is an infectious disease that most often affects the lungs and is caused by a type of bacteria. 
• Symptoms: prolonged cough (sometimes with blood), chest pain, weakness, fatigue, weight loss, fever, and night sweats.
• Caused by: bacteria (Mycobacterium tuberculosis) that most often affect the lungs, but can also attack any part of the body such as the kidney, spine, and brain.
• Transmission: TB is highly contagious and spreads from person to person through the air.
• Treatment: It is curable and preventable. TB can usually be treated with a course of 4 standard, or first-line, anti-TB drugs.

KEY INITIATIVES TO COMBAT TB

• India: National Tuberculosis Elimination Programme (NTEP): launched in 1997, aims at achieving universal access to TB diagnosis and treatment, National Strategic Plan (NSP) 2017 - 2025: to eliminate TB as a public health problem by 2025 and NI-KSHAY- (Ni=End, Kshay=TB).
• Global: SDG Target 3.3 - By 2030, end the epidemics of AIDS, TB, malaria and neglected tropical diseases, and combat hepatitis, water-borne diseases and other communicable diseases and WHO End TB Strategy: As compared with 2015, 80% reduction in the TB incidence rate by 2030; 90% reduction in the annual number of TB deaths by 2030; No households affected by TB face catastrophic costs by 2020.