WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 -- The World Health Organization (WHO) and World Bank jointly launched a $9.3 billion global plan Tuesday to curb tuberculosis infection, which kills two million people annually, especially in developing countries. WHO Director General Gro Harlem Brundtland appealed to nations to raise $4.5 billion of the $9.3 billion fund needed to implement the project. Officials said the plan targets to diagnose 75% of people infected with the disease worldwide and cure 85% of those cases by 2005. The plan will save some 16 million lives by the end of the project, the officials said. To achieve its goals, the plan aims to increase access to effective medical treatments and powerful antibiotics in developing countries, develop drugs effective in combating multidrug resistant tuberculosis, and develop medical treatments that prevent the creation of such strains. WHO officials said infections are rising at an alarming rate, aggravated by the spread of drug-resistant strains and the AIDS epidemic. The officials said the annual infection rate is 10% in areas south of the Sahara Desert in Africa.
Eighty percent of the total number of tuberculosis patients are concentrated in 22 developing countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kenya and Colombia, they added. The flood of refugees from Afghanistan to the borders of Pakistan presents a risk that even more people ill be infected with the disease.
Back to Home Page - Top of Page