The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Tuberculosis Control Programme has completed the registration of 34,000 patients who have suffered from TB since December 2009, including 6,500 patients from Peshawar, who are being provided free of cost treatment in TB control centres established in various hospitals across the province, KP TB Control Programme Regional Coordinator Doctor Hamz-u-llah Khan said during a seminar titled “Media and Public Awareness” at a local hotel in Peshawar on Monday.
Khan said owing to old traditions in the society, TB patients were being discriminated against even though it does not spread through the use of same utensils or touching, adding that free of cost treatment and test facilities were being provided in TB control centres.
Regarding symptoms of TB, he said along with temperature, the patients feel weakness, loss of appetite, cough and difficulty in breathing because of the infection that occurs in the upper lungs and can also lead to coughing up blood.
He said patients must contact the nearby TB control centre as soon as they detect any of the symptoms and they would be provided with proper care and treatment, adding that if the patients do not go through complete treatment, the disease might become incurable.
Regarding the total number of TB patients, he said around two billion people had been affected by this viral disease while one TB positive patient can infect 15 other people, adding that around 0.3 million people were suffering from lungs TB, which include 70 percent young people.
He appreciated the services of global funds and mercy corps and said they were providing resources against TB, AIDs and malaria to end these diseases in Pakistan by 2015.
