Health ministry signs MoUs with defence, railways to end TB menace

Three key ministries of the Union government have decided to come together to fight

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Three key ministries of the Union government have decided to come together to fight tuberculosis (TB).

The Union ministry of health and family welfare has signed memorandum of understanding (MoUs) with the ministry of AYUSH, defence and railways to strengthen “inter-ministerial coordination” to end TB by 2025. Earlier this week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reminded the BJP MPs that India was aiming to achieve TB-free status by the year 2025—five years ahead of the global target (2030). During his previous term, Modi had written to chief ministers of all states, asking them to work towards eradicating TB.

Experts have pointed out that the 2025 target is an ambitious one, given that India has the highest number of tuberculosis cases in the world. Each year, 29 lakh new cases of TB are being reported, and 4.20 lakh people, mostly poor, die of the disease. Economic loss due to TB has been calculated to be around Rs 20,000 crore per annum.

The Union health ministry need not work in a silo, and initiating multi-sectoral action—just as was done in the case of polio disease—is one of the key strategies that will bolster the efforts to reach the 2025 target, Dr Harsh Vardhan, Union minister for health and family welfare, said. “TB is not only a medical problem. It has social dimensions and needs to be addressed through a multi-sectoral approach. All of us can be leaders to end TB in our own capacities. I believe that together we will be able to develop new approaches to combat such threats to our health and society,” he said.

The idea behind this inter-ministerial action is to reach various sections of people served by different ministries, such as workers, miners, migrant and tribal populations.

Shripad Yesso Naik, Union minister of state for AYUSH and minister of state for defence, said the MoU will help in development of linkages and integration of TB care services. It will also help increase awareness about the government's Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme guidelines, diagnosis, treatment and recent policy changes and initiatives regarding the disease among AYUSH service providers.

Though the disease is entirely preventable and curable, TB is being seen as a major obstacle to the country's human and economic development. According to the health ministry, India is predicted to have the world’s largest working population and a disease such as TB that affects adults (mostly) in their most productive years, poses a great risk to the country’s economic growth potential. Besides being a public health problem, TB is also associated with poor socio-economic development, marginalisation and exploitation.