70,000 Indian TB patients need second-line treatment

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70,000 Indian TB patients need second-line treatment

By Kavita Bajeli-Datt

New Delhi, March 26 (IANS) An estimated 70,000 people detected with multi-drug

resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) require quality second-line treatment in India,

World Health Organisation (WHO) experts say. " In the Southeast Asia region there

are an estimated 150,000 MDR-TB patients, of whom 70,000 are in India alone, "

Nani Nair, regional advisor in the department of communicable diseases in WHO,

told IANS.

 

" What India needs is quality second-line drugs to treat these patients who

develop resistance to the first-line drugs, " she said.

 

MDR-TB is a totally man-made problem as people either take incorrect treatment

or don't complete it, Nair said. " TB could be easily cured if a patient takes

the right drug regimen for six months regularly, " she said.

 

According to the just-released WHO report, " Tuberculosis in the Southeast Asia

Region " , India is home to over 3.4 million tuberculosis patients - about

one-fifth of the global figure - making it the most TB prevalent country.

 

It revealed that 325,172 people in India had died of the disease in 2005 alone.

The report said that in 2006 India recorded 1.9 million new cases. Across the

globe, there were 9.2 million new cases of TB during the same period.

 

Of all fresh cases in the country, 1.2 percent is infected with HIV and 2.8

percent of all new cases have been diagnosed with multi-drug resistant TB, it

said.

 

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