Revised National Tuberculosis Control Program in India: The Need to Strengthen

Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It is spread through the air from people suffering from TB. A single patient can infect ten or more people in one year. TB remains a major public health problem in India, with the country accounting for 26% of all TB cases reported globally. In 2011, out of the estimated global annual incidence of 8.8 million TB cases, nearly 2.3 million were estimated to have occurred in India. In 1992, the Government of India, together with the World Health Organization (WHO) and Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA), reviewed the national tuberculosis program and concluded that it suffered from managerial weaknesses, inadequate funding, over-reliance on x-ray, non-standard treatment regimens, low rates of treatment completion, and lack of systematic information on treatment outcomes. As a result, the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Program (RNTCP), based on the internationally recommended Directly Observed Treatment Shortcourse (DOTS) strategy, was launched in 1997 and implemented a phased expansion, achieving nationwide program coverage in March 2006. This program now covers more than 1 billion (1164 million) populations across 632 districts in 35 states and union territories. DOTS has initiated more than 12.8 million TB patients on treatment, saving an additional 2.3 million lives. Department of Community Medicine, Pt. B D Sharma PGIMS, Rohtak, Haryana, India. Correspondence to: Dr. Ramesh Verma, 239, Subhash Nagar Rohtak, Haryana, India. E-mail: [email protected] Date of Submission: Sep 04, 2012