The Unnecessary Persistence of Tuberculosis

As the new report makes clear, the success achieved thus far in TB, even if modest compared with the dramatic drop in malaria and HIV infection rates, may be in jeopardy. In 2015, 1.8 million people died from TB, an increase from 1.5 million in 2014. Approximately one million of those infected with TB were children, and nearly 200,000 children died of TB in the past year. TB also complicates the treatment of other diseases. In 2015, fully 35 percent of global HIV deaths were due to TB. The disease is present in every part of the world, although it is particularly prevalent in the South-East Asia and Western Pacific Regions, where about 60 percent of new global cases can be found. But the burden of TB is heaviest in Africa, where, in 2014, the continent suffered from 281 cases per 100,000 people, markedly higher than the global average of 133 cases per 100,000.

It is important to stress that TB is curable. The treatment is antibiotics, administered regularly over the course of at least six months. Why, then, with a cure at our disposal, is our progress on TB so slow? The answer lies not in the treatment itself, but in our capacity to deliver treatment effectively, and in the broader conditions that weaken the health systems needed to help deal with the disease.