55 die of Tuberculosis each day in Vietnam
HANOI - Tuberculosis kills about 20,000 people every year in Vietnam,
or about 55 people each day, an official said Tuesday.
About 145,000 people, including 20,000 children, contract TB each year
out of a population of 78 million, said Nguyen Viet Co, director of
the Institute of Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases. Most are from poor
families.
With the addition of patients who were previously diagnosed, the total
number of TB patients is about 220,000, Co said.
Vietnam ranks 11th in the world in terms of the number of TB patients
and third in Asia after China and the Philippines, he said.
Co blamed the country's high rate of TB on the low level of social and
economic development, including widespread poverty,
poor environmental hygiene, low investment in TB treatment and
prevention, and increasing levels of HIV-AIDS infections, which
increase susceptibility to TB.
In 1995, the government launched a national anti-TB program budgeted at
between 15 billion dong ($1 million) and 18 billion dong (dlrs 1.2
million) per year,
enough to satisfy only one fourth of the need, Co said.
The World Bank is assisting the anti-TB program with dlrs 16.5 million
over five years starting in 1998, he said.
The Dutch government is also providing $7.5 million to battle the
disease over the next five years, he said.
Vietnam has been recognized by the World Health Organization as one of
seven countries which are successfully battling TB
by meeting its criteria of recognizing more than 70 percent of TB
patients and curing more than 85 percent, he said.
The Associated Pres - May 30, 2001
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