LyrArc Article Gist
India has 2.3 million of the 9 million tuberculosis (TB) cases reported annually. About 100,000 of these are drug resistant strains. Existing treatment methods do not work for drug resistant cases, actually exacerbating the conditions as the strains thrive if the antibiotics fail. Cases of drug resistant TB are reported in Mumbai, Bangalore and New Delhi. Experts say the $236 million India spends on TB treatment and control is not enough to deal with the problem. India lacks the machines that can detect drug resistant TB in 2 hours and patients with drug resistant TB wait for months taking treatments that fail before it is detected. The WHO provides these machines at a cost of $70,000 per machine and each patient test is $16. The first cases were detected in 2006, and India began building labs for this strain in 2008. So far 37 labs have been built treating 5000 patients. The WHO has tried to persuade India to get the diagnostic machines since 2010, which can do the work of detection for drug resistant strains much faster. These machines are in pilot programs and India will buy more if they work says Dr Kumar, head of India's TB program. Doctors at Hinduja Hospital in Bombay, including Dr. Udwadia, are not convinced and see the efforts as slow and bureaucratic. Dr Kumar says the government has focussed on regular TB which only costs $9 or 500 rupees to treat and cure compared to the $1800 or 100,000 rupees it takes to treat drug resistant TB.