Shillong, June 23: Mission Director, National Health Mission Ram Kumar S said there is a need to treat tuberculosis like the state addressed Covid.
Addressing an advocacy meet for the media persons on Thursday, Kumar said as there were over 1500 deaths due to Covid for the last two years , the number of deaths due to tuberculosis was 400 during the same period and hence there is an urgent need to address the disease.
Kumar, who himself was a TB patient, said that attention was given to Covid since it affected all sections of the society whereas people affected by TB.are the poor.
He, however, said the way the state focused to treat Covid , the same approach should be adopted to deal with TB.
State TB officer Dr M Mawrie said as the state’s attention was more on Covid, there was lack of focus to treat the tuberculosis patients.
TB survivors Andrew Marbaniang and Phinolin Kharmawlong told the participants as to how they overcame the disease.
As the the government is waiting for vaccines, it has initiated several steps to detect cases and treat them.
From January till May, there are 1860 active cases in the state as per the NIKSHAY portal
The participants also took pledge to eliminate TB ( in picture) on the occasion.
