Page 66 - Mann Ki Baat September 2022
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Community Ownership Critical to
Accelerate Efforts to End TB in India
health spending, with an
estimated 30–80% of TB-affected
households in the Region
incurring catastrophic costs,
despite access to free TB
diagnostic and treatment
services.
The COVID-19 pandemic has
exacerbated the social and
economic determinants of TB,
pushing tens of millions of people
Poonam Khetrapal
in the Region into extreme
Regional Director, poverty, and heightening
Southeast Asia, WHO undernutrition, which in 2019 is
estimated to have contributed to
nearly a million new TB cases in
the Region.
Today, and in the months and
years ahead, addressing these
determinants – and empowering
Community ownership and TB-affected communities – is
empowerment are critical to critical. And on this, India
accelerate efforts to end TB by continues to lead from the front.
2030, in line with the WHO South- In October 2021, at a virtual
East Asia Region’s eight Flagship ministerial meeting co-hosted by
Priorities, the Sustainable India, Indonesia and Nepal,
Development Goals and the countries of the Region committed
Global End TB Strategy. to renew the TB response, drawing
Since as early as 1944, an on the legacy of the 2018 Delhi
effective antibiotic has been End TB Summit and the Region’s
available to treat TB. However, the Statement of Action.
fight against TB has traditionally Member States also endorsed
followed a biomedical approach, a new Regional Strategic Plan
disconnected from key social and towards ending TB by 2030, which
economic determinants, such as calls for community-led
poverty and undernutrition. monitoring, participation and
In the South-East Asia Region, engagement in TB governance,
TB continues to be closely law and policy reform, as well as
associated with catastrophic increased social protection,
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