COIMBATORE: There is a 9% spike in tuberculosis cases in the Coimbatore district, and 13% increase across Tamil Nadu this year, revealed a study conducted by the health department for the Union government.
The Union government is implementing the National Tuberculosis Eradication Programme in order to eradicate TB by the year 2025. Under this scheme, various measures are being taken for the early detection and treatment of tuberculosis.
According to the study, 3,200 people in Coimbatore were diagnosed with tuberculosis between January and October 2021. During the same period this year, 3,533 people have been diagnosed with tuberculosis.
Official sources from the programme said in the second quarter of 2021, the intensity of COVID-19 infection was high across the country, and very few came forward to get tested since the symptoms of COVID-19 and tuberculosis are similar. Due to this, the number of TB cases was very low in the second quarter of last year.
With COVID- 19 situation easing considerably, more people are getting tested, officials said and attributed this to increased awareness. “Due to the decline in the number of COVID-19 cases, more TB tests were carried out, because of which the number of people diagnosed with the illness has increased. An additional 333 people have been diagnosed with TB in 2022. Apart from this, most of the patients from the district have been diagnosed with early-stage tuberculosis and they would recover completely after 6 months of treatment,” they added.