WHO calls for direct engagement to end tuberculosis

Ahead of World Tuberculosis Day on March 24, WHO today pitched for a direct engagement with communities for case detection, treatment completion and addressing out-of-pocket expenditures and stressed on addressing its social determinants to end the disease.
"To end TB, there is a need to reach out to and engage with communities directly for case detection, treatment completion and addressing out-of-pocket expenditures.
"Forging partnerships with civil society groups and between public and private care providers will likewise ensure that present gaps are closed and that a society-wide movement to end TB develops," Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director, WHO South-East Asia Region, said.

Singh was speaking at an event 'Unite to End TB: Fast Tracking access to quality diagnosis and treatment' organised by Health Ministry and WHO.
Singh also stressed on addressing the social determinants of tuberculosis as it still remains a disease of the poor and the marginalized, with a disproportionate number of cases found among people living with HIV, migrants, refugees and prisoners.
"Addressing poverty and other determinants will have a dramatic effect on the disease's burden. Policies in this regard could include increasing access to safe housing and providing viable social security among other options.

"TB isn't only a health problem. Therefore, its solutions must also encompass the full range of multi-sectoral dimensions and multi-stakeholder engagement. It is one of those diseases that require health in all policies, coupled with strengthening the full spectrum of human rights that guarantee a TB patient the right to the best treatment possible," she said.

Universal health coverage means unreached and marginalised populations can access TB screening, and, if infected, can receive the care they need. With approximately 1 million missing cases in the region, increased screening and treatment will also prove critical to stopping TB transmission, particularly of the disease's drug-resistant strains, she said.
"Also, political commitment at the highest level, must be reinforced. The mission-like zeal with which polio and HIV/AIDS have been fought must be reproduced in the battle against TB and must lead to organisational and programming shifts," she said.