Can India Achieve Its Ambitious Tuberculosis Elimination Goal?

India has set an ambitious target to eliminate tuberculosis (TB) by 2025, five years ahead of the global sustainable development goal (SDG) deadline of 2030.

- HEMANT KUMAR ROUT @Bhubaneswar

India has set an ambitious target to eliminate tuberculosis (TB) by 2025, five years ahead of the global sustainable development goal (SDG) deadline of 2030. The SDG goal for 2030 is 90% reduction in TB deaths and 80% reduction in TB incidence as compared to 2015.

But can India achieve its self-imposed target, especially as TB notifications touched a staggering 26.07 lakh cases in 2024, the highest in recent years? Health experts are divided. Some claimed that the rise in cases is actually a good sign as the country plans to enter the elimination phase while others termed the target unrealistic given the uptick in new TB cases.

Dr Banani Jena, head of the Respiratory Medicine at SUM Hospital, Bhubaneswar and president of Odisha Chest Society, said a spike in TB notifications is a positive development from a public health perspective. It indicates that the system is identifying more cases and bringing them into treatment, which is crucial before entering the elimination phase, she explained.

TB, a bacterial disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis, mainly affects the lungs but can also impact other organs of the body, including the brain, kidneys, and spine. It spreads through the air when people cough, sneeze, or even talk.

Despite being both preventable and curable, TB remains one of the top infectious killers worldwide. According to WHO's Global TB Report 2024, an estimated 10.6 million people worldwide developed TB, and 1.3 million lost their lives to the disease.

WHO has identified 33 countries with low TB incidence rates as potential candidates for TB elimination. Nations such as Iceland and Cyprus have reached 'pre-elimination' levels, reporting fewer than 10 new cases per million people per year. However, no country has yet achieved full TB elimination.