Nigeria, seven others account for two-thirds TB burden – WHO

The 2024 global tuberculosis report by the World Health Organisation showed that Nigeria, India, Indonesia, China, the Philippines, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and the Democratic Republic of Congo account for more than two-thirds of the global total TB burden.

The report is based primarily on data gathered by WHO from national ministries of health in annual rounds of data collection.

TB is an infectious disease caused by bacteria that most often affects the lungs.

It spreads through the air when people with TB cough, sneeze or spit.

The report, titled, ‘Global TB report 2024,’ indicated that the global TB incidence rate (new cases per 100,000 population per year) is estimated to have increased by 4.6 per cent between 2020 and 2023, from 129 in 2020 to 134 in 2023, following declines of about two per cent per year between 2010 and 2020.

“Geographically, most people who developed TB in 2023 were in the WHO regions of South-East Asia (45 per cent), Africa (24 per cent) and the Western Pacific (17 per cent), with smaller proportions in the Eastern Mediterranean (8.6 per cent), the Americas (3.2 per cent) and Europe (2.1 per cent).

“The 30 high TB burden countries accounted for 87 per cent of all estimated incident cases worldwide, with eight of these countries accounting for more than two thirds of the global total: India (26 per cent), Indonesia (10 per cent), China (6.8 per cent), the Philippines (6.8 per cent), Pakistan (6.3 per cent), Nigeria (4.6 per cent), Bangladesh (3.5 per cent) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (3.1 per cent).

The top five countries accounted for 56 per cent of the global total,” it noted.

The report, however, said Nigeria and 12 other countries were estimated to have achieved reductions of 50 per cent or more between 2015 and 2023.

“As of September 2024, there were 13 countries actively interested in implementing a national TB prevalence survey: Bangladesh, Botswana, Ethiopia, Ghana, Indonesia, Malawi, Nigeria, Pakistan, Thailand, Uganda, the United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe,” it added.

It said by 2023, TB case notifications in most of the 30 high TB burden and three global TB watch list countries had recovered to the pre-COVID level or beyond.

“The exceptions were Angola, Lesotho, Liberia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Thailand and Zimbabwe. The two countries that made the biggest contributions to the global rebound in the reported number of people newly diagnosed with TB in 2022 and 2023 were India and Indonesia,” the report read partly.

It added that to achieve the Universal Health Coverage, substantial increases in investment in health care are critical.