KARACHI, March 15: The World Tuberculosis (TB) Day will be observed on March 24.

According to a WHO statement on Saturday, TB is an ancient infectious disease which kills around two to three million people every year around the world.

Roughly half of the victims are women. Some one gets newly-infected with TB every second in the world, the statement added.

It said it is estimated that by the year 2020 about one billion people will be the new cases of TB.

The global prevalence of the disease is around 16 to 20 million while eight mill-ion new cases develop every year.

Most of the TB cases occur in the developing countries and attack persons in their most economically productive age group of 15-49 years.

Furthermore, more women of child-bearing age die of TB than from all causes of maternal mortality combined.—APP