Twenty-five percent of global tuberculosis cases occur in Africa although the continent's population comprises only 11 percent of the world’s total, the United Nations Secretary-General's Special Envoy to Stop Tuberculosis (TB), Jorge Sampaio, said on Wednesday, urging aid donors to increase their support for projects to combat the disease.
"Eliminating TB as a public health problem in Africa is a endless battle. The main point is that TB and poverty are closely linked and form a vicious cycle," Sampaio, a former president of Portugal, told reporters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, where he was attending the UN World Health Organization's (WHO) African regional committee meeting.
"HIV/AIDS and TB together display a noxious synergy. In some regions up to 77 percent of TB patients also have HIV/AIDS. Obstacles to [controlling] TB in Africa are enormous. But inaction will be a blot on our consciences, a failure of political governance," said Sampaio.
The envoy said an estimated 2.3 million people had fallen ill with TB in Africa in 2004. More than eight million new cases of the disease, which kills 5,000 people around the world daily, are detected annually.
Sampaio is leading a call for countries to fully fund and implement the Global Plan to Stop TB 2006-2015, which was launched by WHO earlier this year. The plan sets out actions required to treat and cure 50 million TB patients, and save 14 million lives.
dt/jn/mw
"Eliminating TB as a public health problem in Africa is a endless battle. The main point is that TB and poverty are closely linked and form a vicious cycle," Sampaio, a former president of Portugal, told reporters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, where he was attending the UN World Health Organization's (WHO) African regional committee meeting.
"HIV/AIDS and TB together display a noxious synergy. In some regions up to 77 percent of TB patients also have HIV/AIDS. Obstacles to [controlling] TB in Africa are enormous. But inaction will be a blot on our consciences, a failure of political governance," said Sampaio.
The envoy said an estimated 2.3 million people had fallen ill with TB in Africa in 2004. More than eight million new cases of the disease, which kills 5,000 people around the world daily, are detected annually.
Sampaio is leading a call for countries to fully fund and implement the Global Plan to Stop TB 2006-2015, which was launched by WHO earlier this year. The plan sets out actions required to treat and cure 50 million TB patients, and save 14 million lives.
dt/jn/mw
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
Share this article
