World Tuberculosis Day, observed on March 24 each year, is designed to build public awareness about the global epidemic of tuberculosis (TB) and efforts to eliminate the disease. In 2012, 8.6 million people fell ill with TB, and 1.3 million died from the disease, mostly in the developing countries.
TB, the world's top infectious disease killer, claims 5 000 lives each day. The heaviest burden is carried by communities which already face socio-economic challenges: migrants, refugees, prisoners, ethnic minorities, miners and others working and living in risk-prone settings, and marginalised women, children and older people.
Poverty, malnutrition, poor housing and sanitation, compounded by other risk factors such as HIV, tobacco, alcohol use and diabetes, can put people at heightened risk of TB and make it harder for them to access care. More than a third (4.3 million) of people with TB go undiagnosed or unreported, some receive no care at all and others access to care of questionable quality.
World TB Day is an opportunity to mobilise political and social commitment for further progress in efforts to end TB. This year, World TB Day signals new momentum at the highest levels with the announcement of the first ever Global Ministerial Conference on Ending TB, which will be held in Moscow in November 2017.
In India, each year, approx. 220, 000 deaths are reported due to Tuberculosis. India bears a disproportionately large burden of the world's tuberculosis rates, as it continues to be the biggest health problem in India. It remains one of the largest on India's health and wellness scale. India is the highest TB burden country with World Health Organization (WHO) statistics for 2011 giving an estimated incidence figure of 2.2 million cases of TB for India out of a global incidence of 9.6 million cases.
Because its economy is still developing, the citizens are still fighting for their rights, and the structure of the country lies in poor evidence that it is not fit as other countries still. TB rises high in India because of the majority of people not being able to afford the treatment drugs prescribed to diagnosed patients. To combat this huge problem, the government has instated a new program to try to provide free drugs to all those infected in the country.
