With a virtually unregulated private health system, an increase in notification of TB patients could be heartening for the government. But for the public health system, it is bad news.
Over the last month or so, we saw some important documentation on India’s public health. The Annual India Tuberculosis (TB) report was released by the government on September 26. India is now home to about a quarter of the total global TB patients. The current government is committed to ending TB in India by 2025.
On October 2, Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared that rural India was open defecation free (ODF). On October 16, the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2019 was also released; it put India at 102 in a list of 117 countries. Unfortunately, India’s ranking was below Nepal (73), Bangladesh (88) and Pakistan (94). Over the last century or so, it has been established beyond doubt that TB is more of a social disease owing its roots to poverty, malnutrition and poor sanitary conditions.
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