Pakistan ranked 6th among high disease burden countries

ISLAMABAD, Jun 2 (APP): Pakistan is ranked 6th amongst 22 high
disease burden countries of the world and 40 percent of the burden of disease in
the country is in the form of communicable diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis.
This was revealed in the economic survey launched by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar during a press conference here on Thursday.
Incidence of TB stands at 231 per 100,000 persons and prevalence of about 300 cases per 100,000 population.
National TB Control Program (NTP) has achieved over 80 percent
Directly Observed Treatment System (DOTS) coverage in public sector and
in the last five years the programme has provided care to more than half a
million TB patients in Pakistan.
The programme is moving steadily to achieve the global targets of 70
percent case detection.
There are areas where NTP has to improve suspect management, contact management; quality bacteriology services, engaging all care providers through public private partnership (PPP), inter sectoral collaboration, monitoring and supervision, research for Evidence Based Planning (EBP) and Advocacy, Communication and Social Mobilization (ACSM).
Currently with a total number of 211500 notified TB patients in the country, Pakistan ranks among the 22 high TB burden countries and the treatment success rate remained 91 percent.