Steps on to identify 5.5 lakh unreported TB cases: Choubey

Efforts are on to identify about 5.5 lakh tuberculosis cases, which went unreported last year in India, to extend benefits of various government schemes to this section, Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Ashwini Kumar Choubey said on Wednesday.

Speaking at a TB awareness programme here, the minister said there are about 21.5 lakh TB patients in the country and they are being tagged with their Aadhar number to enable them to avail government schemes for treatment.

"There are 21.5 lakh TB patients in our country and we estimate that there are about 5.5 lakh unreported cases. We are trying to identify them and link them with Aadhar number so that they also will get government benefits for the treatment," Choubey said.

He said though the World Health Organisation set 2030 as deadline to eradicate the infectious disease from the globe, Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to get rid of it by 2025 in the country.

Seeking States cooperation, he saidhis ministry has written to all the state governments to join the endeavour and work as 'Team India' to eradicate the disease from the country.

According to him, India has 27 per cent of the world TB patients.

Telangana Health Minister E Rajender said it is estimated that there are about 12,000 deaths per annum due to TB in the State.