Efforts by the Health Department to curb Tuberculosis (TB) on Daru Island in Western Province are being boosted with K8 million support from the Government.
This funding will be used by the National TB program to strengthen activities they have in Daru.
TB Manager Dr Paul Aiya says the TB situation on Daru is unfortunate but they are doing all they can to help cure people.
He says the money will be used to strengthen the TB ward at the Daru General Hospital as it is currently overcrowded.
The TB response team in Daru have set up four treatment posts through communities to make treatment closer and more accessible to people.
Dr Aiya says they will be building four more posts and provide support to partners of the TB program like World Vision.
The National TB Program has a budget of K40 million for this year and for the response to TB in Daru K17million was allocated.
Dr Aiya could not provide the total number of TB cases in Daru as he says the report is not yet ready.
However, he says there is strong and effective coordination by international partners to support the country’s leadership of the response that has included funding key health personals, improving equipment for diagnosis and management, delivering essential drugs, upgrading infrastructure, transport to support mobile outreach, better community awareness and training rural community health workers and volunteers
The TB situation in Western Province has long been recognised as a major public health issue
The Health Department says almost one percent of the population in the province develops TB each year.
Since 2012, a scaled-up response to TB in the province has identified more TB patients including an increase in notifications of drug-resistant TB (DR-TB) in the South Fly District.