The National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Control Programme (NTBLCP) has said that about 302, 096 out of 407, 000 cases of tuberculosis were undetected in Nigeria last year.
At a press briefing in Abuja on Thursday ahead of the 2017 World TB Day, National Coordinator of NTBLCP, Adebola Lawanson, said, “The 2017 WHO Global TB report revealed that Nigeria is among the ten countries that accounted for 64 percent of the global gap in TB case finding with India, Indonesia and Nigeria alone accounting for almost half the total gap.
“In 2017, Nigeria notified a total of 104, 904 TB cases which is 26 percent of the estimated 407, 000 TB cases for the country in the same year. This huge gap in TB case finding is much higher among children aged zero to 14 with a child proportion of seven percent for 2017.”
Against that backdrop, Lawanson, who was represented by Dr. Muhammad Ozi Ahmed, said that the Federal Ministry of Health had declared 2018 a year to accelerate finding and notification of TB cases amidst concern that Nigeria was among seven countries that accounted for 67 percent of the total global burden.
She said Nigeria’s declaration “aims at mobilising political commitment and resources from all levels of government and partners for the implementation of strategic TB case interventions for early TB case finding and prompt treatment.”
She, however, noted that “achieving the reduction in TB incidence rate for attainment of the 90-90-90 target of the END TB strategy will be a mirage, if something drastic is not done.”
Comments