admin
Douglas Chiteka Herald Reporter
The number of tuberculosis-related illnesses in Zimbabwe has significantly dropped from 60 000 in 2003 to about 35 000 last year, a health official has said. Deputy director of AIDS and TB in the Ministry of Health and Child Care Dr Charles Sandy said this in Harare last week. The decline is attributed to Zimbabwe’s adoption of a new tool known as “gene expert” to diagnose drug resistant TB (DR-TB).
Dr Sandy said the gene expert machine makes a diagnosis of TB within two hours, and Government and its partners had secured 58 of the machines.
The Global Fund is willing to bring in 30 more machines, he said.
“The fact that we were using a tool which is more than 100 years old before indicated that there hasn’t been a lot of progress in diagnosis of TB,” he said.
He added that Government’s efforts to make available second line TB drugs had also contributed to the reduction.
Dr Sandy said over the past five years at a global level a lot of progress had been made in combatting TB.
Online Reporter