Tuberculosis remains one of the world’s deadliest infectious diseases and remains a major public health challenge globally, health minister Dr Kalumbi Shangula has said.
Therefore, Shangula has called on Namibians to join hands and help end the global epidemic, which was declared by the World Health Organisation in 1993 as a public health emergency.
Shangula, who was speaking during the World TB Day on Friday in the Oshikoto region, said over 4 000 people die of TB every day globally. However, an estimated 66 million lives have survived TB since 2000. “We, therefore, have to ensure that there is equitable access to prevention and care and drive towards achieving universal health coverage. More investment is needed to save millions more lives, accelerating the end of the TB epidemic,” he said.
He stressed that Namibia has made great strides in addressing TB as a public health concern, reaching a treatment success rate of 88% in 2021, just 2% short of reaching the WHO target of 90% for all forms of tuberculosis and a 75% treatment success rate for patients with drug resistant tuberculosis, surpassing the WHO target.
“The country has maintained a positive trend in providing HIV testing for all its TB patients which is almost 100% as well as 99% initiation of antiretroviral therapy for those who tested HIV positive. We are also seeing a decline in the HIV positivity rate amongst TB patients, from almost 60% in 2005 to 30% in 2021,” he further explained.
The minister added that the efforts made by the ministry through the National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Programme and the National HIV Programme are applaudable, particularly during the period when the country was hardest hit by the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Despite these successes, there is more to be done in our fight to end TB in Namibia. We are still ranked amongst the top 10 countries globally with the highest TB incidence rate. Therefore, the World Health Organisation estimates that we could be missing about 44% of our TB cases nationally,” he said.
“It is notable that we are realigning our efforts to address TB alongside all key stakeholders, as advocated in the World Health Organisation’s End TB Strategy, which aims to end TB by 2035. As a signatory to this strategy, we as leaders will ensure that we play our part towards its successful implementation in Namibia.”
United States’ acting deputy chief of mission in Namibia Walter Parrs said the US government through Pepfar is committed to continue working with Namibia to ensure that action is taken to save lives.
Parrs said they will continue to support Namibia in providing TB prevention medicines. “We will continue to help find the people with TB who are not on treatment and help get them the treatment they need,” he said.