One person die of TB every ten minutes in China: Official

About one million new cases of tuberculosis are reported in China each year and around 50,000 people succumb to the disease annually, a health official said today.

The number indicates that one person dies of the disease every ten minutes, said Wang Yu, director with the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Currently, there are 5 million Chinese people who suffer from active tuberculosis, ranking China second among 22 countries that are most heavily plagued by the disease.

Wang added that tuberculosis kills 1.4 million people each year around the world.