The Karnataka government on Tuesday launched a special two-week drive to test patients who recovered from COVID-19 and their family members for tuberculosis. Health Minister Dr Sudhakar K who was speaking at Vidhana Soudha during the launch urged recovered patients and their family members to voluntarily get evaluated for TB. The drive will be held across the state from August 16 to August 31. “We have initiated a special drive to evaluate post-Covid complications in people who have recovered from COVID-19 infection. There are more than 28 lakh people in the state who have recovered from the infection. Since both COVID-19 and TB infect the lungs we have launched this special drive to ensure early detection of TB in people who have recovered from COVID-19,” Dr Sudhakar told reporters. “If it is detected at an early stage, treatment will become easier,” he added.
The drive also comes as existing TB surveillance measures were inadvertently neglected due to the onslaught of the devastating first two waves of the pandemic. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), while COVID-19 infection among TB patients remains limited, it is anticipated that people with both TB and COVID-19 may have poorer treatment outcomes, especially if TB treatment is interrupted. Further, they said health services, including national programmes to combat TB, need to be actively engaged in ensuring an effective and rapid response to COVID-19 while ensuring that TB services are maintained.
State health department officials said since 2017, 75 lakh suspected cases have been identified and 88% of them have been tested. About 3.9% have been detected with TB. Due to the pandemic, the TB evaluation drives have been slightly hit. Sudhakar added, “Hon'ble PM Narendra Modi ji has laid a vision to make India free from TB by 2025 and our state government is working towards this goal.”
‘Arogya Nandana’
Speaking with reporters, Dr Sudhakar also said that the state government will start a new initiative called ‘Arogya Nandana’. The Health Minister said, “Since it is being said that children may be predominantly affected during the third wave, we have decided to launch a new initiative called 'Arogya Nandana'. There are about 1.5 crore children in the state and all of them will be subjected to testing under this initiative.”
“This will be launched by the CM (Basavaraj Bommai) soon. Under this program, children with less immunity power and other comorbidities will be identified and they will be provided with nutritious food and supplements to boost immunity,” he added.