Despite recording a 50 per cent increase in Tuberculosis (TB) notification from 138,591 cases in 2020 to 207,785 in 2021, huge tracing gap still exists in Nigeria.
TB contact tracing helps to identify someone who has been infected with TB in the community and is not aware it. It also identify those people who have had exposure to TB. These persons can then be offered medication to prevent the TB from becoming active while those already infected can be treated to stop the spread of the disease.
However, many of those traced and even those infected are not willing to receive treatment due to fear of stigma, I learned. TB is an infectious disease caused by a bacteria called mycobacterium tuberculosis.
The bacteria affects mostly the lungs and it is spread through the air when a person with TB of the lungs who is not on treatment or not adequately treated, sneezes, coughs, shouts, spits and sings etc as it is transmitted through the air.
Speaking on TB burden in the country, the director and national coordinator, National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Control Programme (NTBLCP), Federal Ministry of Health, Dr Chukwuma Anyaike, said “On annual basis, TB is estimated at 440,000 new cases in Nigeria, and since the inception of the programme the country has struggled to make that breakthrough even though in 2021, we were able to notify 207,000 cases, a 50 per cent increase from what we had in 2020. That shows that the cases are there.
[EDITORIAL] Need For More Action Against Tuberculosis
“TB testing and treatment is free for both children and adults. “No money is charged for TB testing and treatment.
“If you are having cough for more than two weeks and you have taken antibiotics and it is not working, call TB line,” he explained.
Meanwhile, poor funding has been identified as a major setback to TB control in the country.
Of the $373million needed for TB control in the country in 2020, only 31 per cent was available to all the implementers of TB control activities and only seven per cent of the 31 per cent was provided by the Nigerian government while 24 per cent of the funds came from donors.
Stakeholders have noted that adequate funding was crucial to ending the TB epidemic in the country, especially in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic that has put the end to TB progress at risk.
During the 2022 World TB Day, theme: “Invest to end TB. Save lives”
governments at the national and subnational level have been urged to step up funding for TB to save lives.
Meanwhile, Anyaike said the government cannot do it alone, while stressing the need for private sector involvement in the TB control programme in the country.
He, however, said that there was a National Strategic Plan 2021-2025 which captures all the strategies that would be put in place to combat TB in the country.