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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Observation of World Tuberculosis Day in Belgrade

Belgrade, 23 March 2007

Serbian State Secretary at the Ministry of Health Nevena Karanovic said today that the World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared tuberculosis (TB) a global health issue because every year over 8 million people become ill with this disease and around 2 million die of it, mainly in developing countries.

Author: Beta

A press conference was held regarding the observation of the World Tuberculosis Day on March 24, at which, besides Karanovic, other participants were Head of the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) office in Serbia Dorit Nitzan, coordinator of the project “Control of Tuberculosis in Serbia” Natasa Lazarevic-Petrovic, President of the Serbian Committee for Tuberculosis Gordana Radosavljevic-Asic and Secretary General of the Serbian Red Cross Vesna Milenovic.

Karanovic said on the occasion that the WHO has defined a strategy titled Directly Observed Treatment Strategy (DOTS) – short regimen as an organisational framework for fighting tuberculosis in all countries of the world.

She explained that the strategy is based on five principles such as the obligation of the government to support antituberculosis programmes in the country, the detection of TB through saliva analysis as well as the directly observed treatment by standardised therapeutic regimes.

Karanovic further elaborated that the DOTS is based on regular supply of quality antituberculosis drugs and standardised system of models for registering and reporting on the disease.

According to Karanovic, the basic aims of the programmes of tuberculosis control in the world are the detection of at least 70% cases of tuberculosis bacillus patients and curing a minimum of 85%, while the ultimate aims are reduction of the fatality rate, reduction of the rate at which disease develops and its spread, as well as prevention of the development of resistance to first-line antituberculosis drugs.

Karanovic recalled that within the framework of the Ministry of Health, the realisation of the four-year project “Control of Tuberculosis in Serbia”, which is being financed with a donation by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, began on December 1 2004.

The aim of this project is to reduce the number of infected by adequate medical treatment, she said and specified that there are currently 32 persons infected with tuberculosis for 100,000 inhabitants. She added that the Roma are the most vulnerable due to unhygienic settlements, as well as refugees in collective centres and prison inmates.

Nican said that according to the latest data of the World Health Organisation from 2005, there were 445,000 cases of tuberculosis and 66,000 deaths in the European region, of which almost three fourths were recorded in Kazakhstan, Romania, Russia, Turkey, the Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

Radosavljevic-Asic reiterated that tuberculosis is a contagious disease that is spread through the air and that each untreated person treated infects 10 to 15 people per year on average.

The theme of this year's World Tuberculosis Day is "Tuberculosis in One Place - Tuberculosis Everywhere", and in Serbia that day will be observed under the slogan "Get treated in the right way, fight tuberculosis".