WHO Global Tuberculosis Programme:
A virtual high-level event on ‘Global Drive to Scale-up TB Prevention’ was recently organized by WHO Global Tuberculosis Programme.
- The purpose of this special high-level event was to discuss key actions needed at the global and country-level to scale up TB prevention strategies and drive progress towards achieving the 2022 UN High-Level Meeting target on TB preventive treatment.
- TB is an infectious disease caused by the bacillus Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
- It typically affects the lungs (pulmonary TB) but can also affect other sites.
- The disease is spread when people who are sick with pulmonary TB expel bacteria into the air, for example by coughing.
- India is aggressively implementing its fully-funded National Strategic Plan to End TB.
- In the last few years, 50 million people have been treated.
- India seeks to achieve a national scale-up of TB preventive treatment (TPT).
- It also seeks to achieve the UN High-Level Meeting (UNHLM) targets of 40 million persons started on TB treatment and 30 million on TPT globally in the remaining 18 months.
- Sub-national Certification of States and Districts instituted in 2020- The initiative marks districts/States-UTs on “Progress towards TB Free Status” under different categories measured with graded milestones of decline in TB incidence.
