Out of 24.7 lakh patients, 23.6 lakhs (95%) were initiated on treatment. Drug-susceptible TB (DS-TB) is identified on patients who have bacteriologically-confirmed or clinically-diagnosed case of TB without evidence of infection with strains resistant to drugs rifampicin and isoniazid. Rifampin and isoniazid combination is used to treat TB infection. It may be taken alone or with one or more other medicines for TB. Rifampin belongs to the class of medicines called antibiotics and works to kill or prevent the growth of bacteria.

Among the notified DS-TB cases, 61% were male, 39% female and 141,098 (5.7%) were below 15 years of age. Among the TB patients notified in 2022, 87.6% had been successfully treated, while 3.6% died during the treatment, 2.1% were lost to follow-up, 1.9% failed treatment (including regimen changed), and 0.4% were not evaluated (including still on treatment).

The annual report also found that the private sector had better success rates of treatment than the public sector. “Treatment success rates of patients notified from public and private sectors were 86.9% and 89.5% respectively,” the report stated.

With growing incidents of drug resistance cases in TB treatment, the report found that in 2023, a total 63,939 multidrug-resistant tuberculosis/rifampicin-resistant (MDR/RR-TB) cases were identified. Among these, 11,750 patients had pre-XDR-TB (fluoroquinolone-resistant), 114 XDR-TB (fluoroquinolone with linezolid and bedaquiline-resistant) and 23,020 H-mono/poly DR-TB.

From the 2022 cohort, out of 10,799 patients treated with H-mono/poly DR-TB regimen, a total of 9,316 were successfully treated, while 549 died during treatment, 543 were lost to follow-up, 205 failed treatment (including regimen changed), and 186 were not evaluated (including patients still on treatment or outcome not reported). Out of 21,324 patients treated with a shorter MDR/RR-TB (oral + injectable) regimen, a total of 15,970 were successfully treated, 2,136 died during treatment, 2,015 were lost to follow-up, 474 were treatment failures including treatment regimen changed, and 729 were not evaluated including patients still on treatment or outcome not reported.

The report also suggested that only 2.3 lakh missing cases of TB were recorded in 2023, as compared to 3.2 lakh in 2022. Despite an increase in notifications from the private sector, the bulk of tuberculosis cases are still reported to government health centres, according to the report. Of the total 25.5 lakh instances reported in 2023, the private sector accounted for about 33%, or 8.4 lakh cases.

Compared to the projection of 27.4 lakh the previous year, the expected incidence of tuberculosis in 2023 increased to 27.8 lakh. According to the report, the infection-related mortality stayed at 3.2 lakh. The World Health Organization has approved the revised technique that India created and is the basis for these estimations.

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Published: 28 Mar 2024, 08:18 PM IST