Every year, the world observes World TB Day on March 24 to raise awareness of the continued tuberculosis epidemic, especially in the developing world, and efforts to fight it. March 24 is the date in 1882 when mycobacterium tuberculosis – the pathogenic bacteria which causes the disease – was discovered the Nobel Prize winning scientist […]
TB
How Mumbai fares in the fight against TB
Drug resistance is one of the most pressing public health challenges facing India, especially when it comes to tuberculosis (TB). As the country grapples with one of the largest TB burdens in the world, rising cases of drug resistance presents an alarming trend. TB cases which become resistant to the most effective front-line drugs are […]
Sister company of Health Issues India evaluates EU investments in Indian health
A new study reports that it is difficult to show the overall impact of massive European investment in poverty-related diseases. The study was conducted by RAND and Baird’s CMC, a policy research company that is in the same group of companies as Health Issues India. The study, commissioned by the European Union (EU), did report […]
A TB-free India by 2025 – or a drug resistance epidemic?
Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to rid India of tuberculosis (TB) by 2025. This is an ambitious deadline five years in front of the global elimination deadline. Can this goal be achieved or is the new deadline simply political point scoring? The state of TB in India India has a bad track record in […]
Tuberculosis in India: Still the highest number of deaths
Although it still has the world’s highest tuberculosis burden. New infections, as well as deaths due to TB are falling in India. However, evidence has shown the number of drug resistant cases of TB in India are rising rapidly. These drug resistant strains of TB are significantly harder to treat, with some areas not having […]
India has highest rate of child death due to tuberculosis in the world
More children die from tuberculosis in India than anywhere else in the world. The disease killed 60,000 children below the age of 15 in the country in 2015. This represents roughly 25 percent of the global count. India holds a disproportionately high number of cases: TB is a disease that is endemic in low to […]
Madhu Pai: India’s ambitious new plan to conquer TB needs cash and commitment
Tuberculosis (TB) kills more people today than HIV and malaria combined. In 2015, there were an estimated 10.4 million new TB cases worldwide and 1.8 million TB deaths, according to the World Health Organization. And India is at the epicentre of this global epidemic, with half a million TB deaths annually. India also accounts for 16 […]
Bedaquiline and the treatment of tuberculosis
The Indian government is lagging behind in the issue of Tuberculosis (TB) treatment according to Harvard Medical School expert, Jennifer Furin in an email interview with The Hindu. The focal point of the matter is India’s lack of access to treatment via Bedaquiline, a drug capable of treating multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB). Created in response […]