MPs have a key role to play in addressing TB menace: Naidu

New Delhi: Underlining the commitment of the government, which is led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to eliminate tuberculosis (TB) by 2025, Vice President and Chairman Rajya Sabha M Venakaiah Naidu said that the members of Parliament have an important role to play in addressing public health challenges particularly the TB menace.

"Apart from raising such issues in Parliament, members need to be catalysts in the mass awareness campaign in the fight against TB by playing a proactive role in their constituencies," Naidu said. Referring to the significant progress on various health indicators India has achieved since Independence, Naidu highlighted that the average life expectancy has increased to 69.4 years which was 35 years in 1950.

Speaking on this occasion, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla said that time has come for collective action to eradicate TB from India by 2025, which is five years before the sustainable development goals set by the United Nations. Public awareness is the most effective intervention to fight TB in India, Birla added.

Emphasising on the strength of India's collective power, Birla said that if together we can successfully fight the Covid-19, we can easily eradicate TB from our country.

Earlier, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said that health and development are intrinsically linked. However, Mandaviya appealed to all stakeholders, people's representatives, the public and the media to come together to create mass awareness in the direction of its eradication.

A staggering 65 per cent of the tuberculosis cases in India are in the 15-45 age group, which is the most economically productive population segment, Mandaviya said.

This, coupled with the fact that 58 per cent of the TB cases are in rural areas, translates to entire families being excluded from upward mobility due to the disease, he said.