London: The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday that more than 80 lakh people were found to be suffering from tuberculosis (TB) last year. This is the highest number since the beginning of monitoring TB by the WHO. Not only this, more than 12.50 lakh people died of TB in 2023 and this infectious disease has taken the place of Corona.

According to the organization, Southeast Asia, Africa, Western Pacific regions are most affected by it and more than half of the world's TB cases are seen in India, Indonesia, China, Philippines and Pakistan.

WHO Director General said this

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that the reality is that while we have systems in place to prevent, detect and treat TB, it still sickens and kills so many people. Although deaths from TB continue to decline globally and the number of new infections has begun to stabilize, it mostly affects the lungs.

TB mostly affects the lungs

Last year, 400,000 people were estimated to have drug-resistant TB, of which less than half were tested and treated. Tuberculosis is caused by airborne bacteria. It mostly affects the lungs. It is estimated that about one-quarter of the global population has TB, but only 5-10 percent of them develop symptoms.

Indian government released a report on TB

India's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare released its TB Report 2024, showing that the mortality rate due to the infection has declined from 28 per lakh population in 2015 to 23 per lakh population in 2022. The projected incidence of TB in 2023 has increased slightly to 27.8 lakh from the previous year's estimate of 27.4 lakh.

An estimated 1.30 million deaths were caused by TB

In 2022, TB was the second leading cause of death from a single infectious agent in the world, after coronavirus disease (COVID-19), and caused nearly twice as many deaths as HIV/AIDS, the report said.