1.3 million people died of TB worldwide in 2012: WHO

Tuberculosis (TB) killed 1.3 million people worldwide in 2012, while India alone accounted for 26 per cent of total TB cases globally, the WHO said today as it expressed concern over drug-resistant forms of the disease.
The "Global tuberculosis report 2013" released here found that global TB deaths decreased to 1.3 million in 2012, which is 100,000 less than the previous year.
Approximately 75 per cent of total TB deaths occurred in the African and South-East Asia Regions in 2012. India and South Africa accounted for about one-third of global TB deaths, the report said.
The report also found that the number of people ill with TB fell to 8.6 million in 2012.

The largest number of incident cases in 2012 were India (2.0 million-2.4 million), China (0.9 million-1.1 million) and South Africa (0.4 million-0.6 million), the report said.
The majority of TB cases worldwide in 2012 were in the South-East Asia (29 per cent), African (27 per cent) and Western Pacific (19 per cent) regions.

India also accounted for 31 per cent of the estimated 2.9 million missed TB cases - people who were either not diagnosed or diagnosed but not reported to National Tuberculosis Programmes (NTPs), the report said.
WHO also expressed concern over multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) which claimed 170,000 lives in 2012.

The agency estimates that 450,000 people fell ill with (MDR-TB) last year, with the highest burden in China, India and the Russian Federation.
The report also revealed that between 1995 and 2012, 56 million people were successfully treated for TB in countries that had adopted WHO's global TB strategy, saving 22 million lives.
The new data confirm that the world is on track to meet the 2015 UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) target of reversing TB incidence, along with the target of a 50 per cent reduction in the mortality rate by 2015 (compared to 1990), the report said.
"Quality TB care for millions worldwide has driven down TB deaths," said Dr Mario Raviglione, WHO Director of the Global TB Programme.

"But far too many people are still missing out on such care and are suffering as a result. They are not diagnosed, or not treated, or information on the quality of care they receive is unknown," Raviglione said in a statement.