‘India’s success in reducing TB incidence acknowledged by WHO’

India’s success in reducing the incidence of tuberculosis by 16 per cent and mortality due to it by 18 per cent since 2015 has been acknowledged by the

World Health Organisation (WHO) in its Global TB

Report 2023, the Union Health Ministry said on Wednesday.

According to the report, India has made tremendous progress in improving case detection and reversed the impact of COVID-19 on the TB programme, it said.“The treatment coverage has improved to 80 per cent of the estimated TB cases, an increase of 19 per cent

over the previous year,” the ministry said, citing the report.

India’s efforts have resulted in the reduction of tuberculosis incidence by 16 per cent in 2022 from 2015, almost double the pace at which global TB incidence is declining (which is 8.7 per cent), it said, adding that mortality due to the disease has also reduced by 18% during the same period in India. “The World Health Organization has made a downward revision of the TB mortality rates from 4.94 lakhs in 2021 to 3.31 lakhs in 2022, a reduction of over 34 per cent,” the ministry said.

In the Global TB Report 2022, the WHO and the Health Ministry had agreed to publish the data for India as “interim” with an understanding that the WHO would work with the technical team of the ministry, to finalise the figures.

The report notes that India’s intensified case detection strategies have resulted in the highest-ever notification of cases in 2022, during which over

24.22 lakh TB cases were notified, surpassing the pre-COVID levels.