Taiwan Pledges To Reduce by 50% Number of TB Patients Within 10 Years

Taiwan's Center for Disease Control on Sunday pledged to reduce the number of tuberculosis patients in the country by 50% within 10 years in an effort to "avert a resurgence of the killer disease," the Taipei Times reports. According to Taiwan's CDC statistics, 15,000 people become infected with TB annually, and 1,300 die from the disease. "Tuberculosis is still the top killer disease (in Taiwan), responsible for nearly 70% of deaths of communicable diseases. In fact, TB has never left us," Wu Yi-chun, head of the TB prevention section for Taiwan's CDC, said, adding that approximately 1,000 to 2,000 people each year are infected with a multi-drug resistant TB strain. In an effort to curb the spread of TB, health officials plan to increase screening efforts among high-risk groups, including people over the age of 40 and Aboriginal populations. "Aboriginal people, who are four times more likely to get TB and six times more likely to die from it, do not have easy access to medical care," Taiwan CDC Deputy Director Lin Ting said, adding, "They don't get chest X-rays frequently enough." Taiwan's CDC recently has begun sending ambulances to remote mountain villages to provide X-rays and since September 2004 has provided TB treatment for Aboriginals at no cost, according to the Times (Wang, Taipei Times, 3/21).