Parliamentary caucus for TB launched amidst 80% decline in case notification

Islamabad : Pakistan is missing nearly 220,000 cases or a third of all new Tuberculosis (TB) cases every year. Moreover, at a time when TB patients are at far greater risk of contracting COVID-19, a recent rapid the assessment has shown an 80% decline in TB case notifications from April onwards. The pandemic has cost TB control a great deal.

Parliamentary Secretary for Health Dr. Nausheen Hamid expressed these views at the launch of the first-ever Parliamentary Caucus for Tuberculosis here on Tuesday night. The parliamentarians included in the caucus include Senator Dr. Mehar Taj Roghani, MNAs Dr. Nisar Ahmad Cheema, Zille Huma, Uzma Riaz Jadoon, Dr. Shazia Soomro, Dr. Samina Matloob, Prof. Dr. Shahnaz Baloch, Dr. Seemi Bukhari, Dr. Sumaira Shams, Shunila Ruth and Nuzhat Pathan and Sindh MPAs Dr. Seema Zia and Dr. Mukesh.

Speaking as head of the caucus and its Secretariat, Dr. Nausheen said, the government is enhancing public-private partnerships in order to reach the most peripheral populations and marginalized groups. She was confident that the caucus will emerge as a unique network of elected political representatives committed to fighting TB and raising the profile of the disease amongst fellow legislators, while engaging local decision-makers.

“Today, we will sign a historic declaration that will demonstrate our support and solidarity for efforts to end the TB epidemic,” Nausheen asserted. She acknowledged the support of the Stop TB Partnership, DOPASI Foundation, Stop TB Pakistan and the National TB Control Programme in launching the caucus which includes a Senator, MNAs from all sides of the National Assembly, and two Members of the Sindh Assembly.

Addressing the meeting online, the Executive Director of the Stop TB Partnership Dr. Lucica Ditiu congratulated Pakistan on this happy development and hoped that the caucus would succeed in its end-TB mission. She pointed out that the entire world community is focusing on Pakistan in view of its high TB burden and its commitments in the United Nations high-level meeting held in September 2018 by Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi. She called for sensitizing the highest policymakers in Pakistan in order to ensure proper resource mobilization, civil society and community empowerment and tracking of targets until they are achieved.

The Director of the Global TB Programme of WHO Dr. Tereza Kasaeva hoped that Pakistan would pursue the sound technical strategies required to eliminate TB and assured continued technical support of WHO in this area.

Congratulating Pakistan on the development, Head of TB in USAID Cheri Vincent recalled that her agency had been working with Pakistan’s National TB Control Programme virtually since its inception in 2001 and in a few years’ time, it became the USAID’s flagship programme with regard to US grant assistance in Pakistan’s health sector. She stressed that while NTP Pakistan has achieved a lot despite considerable odds including insufficient domestic funding, it also needs to work at an accelerated pace to create the requisite impact.

Earlier, TB Adviser to the SAPM for Health Dr. Syed Karam Shah gave a presentation indicating the grim situation of TB control in the country, particularly owing to the COVID-19 epidemic. He also dilated on the TB control priorities for Pakistan and highlighted the drop in case of notification since 2019, which has been further adversely affected by the current epidemic. He expressed the need for better case notification by tracking patients receiving drugs from private pharmacies, which could account for a huge proportion of the missing cases.

Tushar Nair from the Global TB Caucus also spoke on the occasion and explained the working of such caucuses at the regional and global levels. Dr Thomas Chiang of USAID highlighted the need for increased domestic funding. Dr Hussain Hadi representing the NTP Manager Pakistan spelt out measures taken by his programme to mitigate the situation caused by the COVID-19 epidemic.

All members of the caucus led by Dr. Nausheen Hamid affixed their signatures on the launching declaring the formation of the caucus and reiterated their willingness to work selflessly towards this cause in their respective constituencies, generally creating awareness to the issue and working together for developing legislation for issues impeding TB care services in Pakistan even though the public sector has been offering free diagnostic and treatment facilities over the past two decades.