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World TB Day 2016 is being celebrated in Nepal amidst various events and activities across the country. National Tuberculosis Centre (NTC) through Ministry of Health and Population organized an event on Thursday, March 24 expressing commitment to the global slogan, ‘Unite to End TB’. The event was organized at National TB Centre premises with the inauguration by paying his tribute to Robert Koch, father of Tuberculosis.

  

 

 

Director of NTC, Dr Bikash Lamichhane in his opening remarks, appreciated the efforts of all stakeholders – institutional and individual who have worked to fight against TB. He stated that since TB programme is one of the prioritized programmes, the NTC is committed to make Nepal TB free. He expressed his satisfaction of meeting the MDG target of tuberculosis, with the new treatment cases reaching 92% success rate and old TB cases reaching 72% success rate. Dr Lamichhane also highlighted services provided to patients such as nutrition and travel allowance, DR hostel and conducting quick TB diagnosis using GeneXpert technology. However, he also admitted some existing challenges such as TB services still out of reach of many people – especially disadvantaged communities and those for whom services are available not completing the medicine course. In terms of the plans in the pipeline, Dr Lamichhane revealed that discussions are underway to make provision of free X-ray services for TB patients. Furthermore, a nationwide TB prevalence survey will be conducted in the near future to identify and reach out to more number of TB suspects.

Honourable Minister of Health Ram Janam Chaudhary opined that political commitment should be made by the government to prioritise health as a development agenda. He also revealed the need to prioritize TB in the next health budget. Highlighting the current context of several existing misconceptions about TB in rural areas, he urged the TB planning and implementing bodies to focus more on preventive rather than curative care.

Secretary for Ministry of Health, Mr Santa Bahadur Shrestha emphasized on the need to inform people and raise awareness about TB in every nook and corner of the country. Mr Shrestha talked of ongoing plans to have a new TB hospital catering specific needs of the TB suspected and affected hospital. He also pointed out the government’s priority in TB by increasing the budget in TB and increasing the investment in first line drugs by seeking support from external development partners such as World Health Organization (WHO).

Chief of Public Health Administration Monitoring and Evaluation Division (PHAMED) Mr G D Thakur reiterated the need to focus on local level intervention by considering the existing situation/context while designing appropriate interventions.

WHO Representative to Nepal Dr Jose Vandelaer came up with some suggestions in order to meet current challenges in the TB sector such as political commitment through existing ministry structures, close collaboration and partnership with private communities, introduction of new and innovative interventions that address the needs of the unreached population, strengthening of the existing TB programme and inter-sectoral collaboration expanding social protection themes.

Along similar lines, as a closing remark to the event, Director General of Department of Health Services Dr Pushpa Chaudhary highlighted on the need to focus on 5 major components:

• Reaching out services at the community level with better engagement of community stakeholders for local ownership
• Strengthening of existing recording, reporting and data management system – including that of private  and non-government sector
• Strengthening of referral system for quick and effective health care services
• Integration of public health intervention programme with clinical service for better management
• Provision of quality service to attract more patients

During the event, various stalls by government and non-government organizations were also placed. HERD also had a stall highlighting research uptake materials – posters, pamphlets and brochures about TB related projects conducted by HERD. HERD team also interacted with various important dignitaries in the field of TB in Nepal which will be developed as a documentary soon.