KARACHI, March 19: The curable tuberculosis (TB) kills about 20,000 people in Sindh due to lack of awareness, said a senior official of the TB Control Programme in the province.
TB, which had been declared a global emergency by the WHO in 1993 and a national emergency in Pakistan from 2001, the disease is still a big killer in the province. Under the WHO set targets for the control of TB, there was a need to detect at least 70 per cent of the existing infectious disease and then curing at least 85 per cent of the detected cases.
According to Dr Ismat Ara, deputy director of the TB Control Programme in Sindh, the people should be told frequently about TB, particularly on the occasion of World TB Day on March 24. She said the disease was much prevalent in the country mainly in underprivileged segments of society.
She disclosed that according to the Sindh TB Control Programme about 65,500 new cases were estimated to develop in Sindh during 2007, out of which 21,100 (32 per cent) would emerge in Karachi.
The diagnostic and treatment facilities are being provided to people through about 205 diagnostic centres in all districts of Sindh, including 64 in Karachi. The highly committed teams of the TB control programme had succeeded in achieving a detection rate of 65 per cent in 2006 while 84 of them were given treatment, said Dr Ismat Ara.
In the meantime, in order to mark World TB Day, various NGOs under the arrangements of the Sindh TB Control Programme have decided to hold a candle walk on March 25, starting from the Civic Centre. A conference on chest diseases and tuberculosis will be held at the Lyari General Hospital on March 22.
