China Medical News

According to the National Health and Family Planning Commission, although there is a downward trend of tuberculosis (TB) cases in recent years, China reports roughly 900,000 new cases annually, keeping it among the 30 countries with the highest incidence of the infectious disease. Latest statistics from the commission's disease prevention and control bureau showed that by the end of 2016, the TB incidence rate stood at 61 per 100,000 people in China, down 14% since 2011.

The commission said that bacterial infection was not evenly distributed across the country, and rural areas in the western regions recorded the highest TB prevalence. The Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region reported the highest TB prevalence, at 184.5 people out of 100,000 in 2015, and the Tibet autonomous region and Guizhou province followed.

The commission has taken number of steps in the past several years to alleviate the TB burden in these areas, including increasing investment for health projects, improving training for local medical staff and encouraging local governments to issue favorable policies for TB patients, such as increasing medical insurance reimbursement for the disease. The commission said that health authorities will continue to support areas with higher reported cases of TB, and it also plans to intensify research in the prevention and control of TB in the next few years, with a focus on vaccines and new therapies for TB including chemotherapies and immunotherapies.

According to a national plan on the control and prevention of TB released by the State Council in February, the Incidence of tuberculosis in China is expected to be reduced to below 58 for every 100,000 people by 2020. According to the document, services for preventing and treating tuberculosis should be further improved by 2020 and those who have the disease should be diagnosed early and given access to regular treatment.

Former president of the Chinese Anti-tuberculosis Association said that there are few new drugs for TB, and those commonly used have lost their effect in many patients due to drug resistance. The WHO estimated that in 2015, China had 57,000 cases of multidrug resistant TB. (Source: China Daily)