Malawi pledges to eradicate TB by 2030 - Chiponda

MALAWI: As Malawi joins the global community in commemorating World Tuberculosis Day, which is officially observed on March 24th each year, Minister of Health Khumbize Kandodo Chiponda stated that all countries, including Malawi, have committed to ending TB by the end of the year 2030.

Khumbize made the remarks today as the guest of honour at the "World Stop TB Day 2022 Commemoration Launch" organized by the National TB Program under the theme "Invest to End TB; Save Lives."

"TB is still a public threat, and we still have it amongst us and as government and citizens, we all need to take a collective responsibility because it is treatable and curable, " said Chiponda.

"From next year's budget, we need to have a certain percentage as a commitment fee from the government because as a government we are also committed to seeing that by the year 2030, TB should be a thing of the past."

Chiponda said Malawi continues to see a decrease in the number of people suffering from tuberculosis, demonstrating that the disease is preventable, treatable, and curable.

She said: “Incidence of TB for Malawi have declined from 338 in every 100,000 in 2010 to 141 in every 100,000 in 2020. This represents a 58% reduction over a 10 year period.”

The Acting WHO Representative, Dr. Janet Kayita, stated in her remarks that the main goal of this launch is to raise public awareness about the devastating health, social, and economic consequences of tuberculosis and to step up efforts to end global TB epidemic.

“We need to do much about Active Case Finding (ACF) because if we find people who are suffering from TB, the treatment is very successful and the cure rates are very high,” Kayita said

She added that in order to meet the target, countries must achieve at least a 10% annual decline in TB incidence until 2025, and then average a 17% annual decline in the following decade.

Malawi currently has no patients suffering from Extensively Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis (XDR-TB), a type of TB with poor treatment outcomes.