2019 India TB Report - Rise in notified Tuberculosis cases— breakup by state, age, gender

On Wednesday Sep 25,2019, the Centre released the India TB Report 2019, which showed a 16% increase in the number of cases in 2018 as compared to the previous year.

The report said 21.5 lakh TB cases were notified to the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) in 2018

 India accounted for a quarter of the Global TB burden with an estimated 27 lakh new cases in the year.

Of the total notifications, 25% (5.4 lakh) cases were from the private sector; a 40% increase over last year.

 Among the notified, treatment was initiated for about 19.1 lakh cases (90%) across both public and private sectors.

The majority of the affected individuals (89%) were in the age group 15-69.

State by state

Uttar Pradesh, with 17% of the population of the country, reported 4.2 lakh cases, accounting for 20% of all notifications (187 cases/lakh population).

Between 2017 and 2018, Haryana saw a large increase in the number of cases, data from the report show (see table). Cases increased significantly in Rajasthan and UP, as well as Delhi.

On the other hand, Odisha witnessed a decline in the number of notified cases from over 67,000 in 2017 to 50,244 in 2018, or about 25%. Odisha was the only such state; the Union Territories of Lakshadweep and Andaman & Nicobar Islands too witnessed a drop.

The two UTs of Delhi and Chandigarh had the highest number of notified patients per lakh population, at 417 and 468, respectively. Their rates of notification are higher because people from many other parts of India get notified from these UTs, the report said.

 

TB & HIV

TB is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality among people living with HIV, and HIV co-infection rates among incident TB patients is estimated to be 3% — 86,000 HIV-associated TB patients are emerging annually. The mortality in this group is very high, and 11,000 people with HIV die every year due to TB, the report said.

India is the third highest HIV-burden country in the world, with an adult prevalence of 0.22%. The report said people living with HIV are at 21 times higher risk of developing TB. Nearly 25% of all deaths among people living with HIV are estimated to be due to TB