Government policymakers are always talking about massive developments in the health sector. They spew out rhetoric on success and progress. But they do not look a bit deeper to see that thousands of people are dying of tuberculosis (TB), an easily curable disease.
On 24 March, Tuberculosis Day, Prothom Alo reported that the country had fallen behind in the TB eradication target. Also, alarming information surfaced in the seminar organised by the health directorate's National Tuberculosis Control Programme and USAID's Alliance for Combatting TB in Bangladesh (ACTB), run by icddr,b. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO)'s latest global tuberculosis report, one person contracts TB every minute in Bangladesh.
Every two hours one person contracts drug-resistant tuberculosis. And one dies every 12 minutes. In 2015, there were 45 deaths from tuberculosis in every 100,000. In 2021 that fell to 25. Concerned officials will certainly agree that this progress is not satisfactory.
Health minister Zahid Maleque also admitted that Bangladesh is one of the eight countries with the highest prevalence of TB patients. He said that 82 per cent of the TB patients received medical treatment. Our question is, why not 100 per cent?
There was a time when TB was considered a taboo and there were all sorts of slogans out there, proclaiming there was no cure for TB, that TB meant death. But we have moved ahead from that situation. Now there are slogans saying that TB is curable. But this cure won't happen automatically. If anyone contracts the TB germ, it must be identified as early as possible and then medical treatment must be provided. Monitoring must be stepped up to make sure no one stops treatment midway. Poor people with TB must be given financial assistance along with medical treatment.
According to the National Tuberculosis Control Strategy Paper, deaths due to TB must be brought down to 18,000 per year within the next two years. But the country is still far from that target. The government cannot dispense of its duty merely by blaming the patients and undiagnosed patients for their lack of awareness. The health department claims that they have successfully tackled Covid. But thousands of people dying every year or the country being on the list of eight risk countries, is not an indication of success.
This year the theme of the World Tuberculosis Day was "Yes, we can end TB!" Now the government must act and prove they can do so. This requires a system where 100 per cent TB cases can be diagnosed and treated. Poor people are afflicted more with this disease due to unhealthy and cramped living conditions. That is why such areas require regular monitoring. The disease must be diagnosed before the patient comes to hospital. Local representatives, educational institutions and NGOs must be involved in the campaign. We want the TB-related deaths to come down to zero before the end of the SDG term.