LETTER

 

---   Tuberculosis during the pandemic 

 

Tuberculosis (TB), despite being preventable and curable, was the world’s leading infectious disease killer before the pandemic, which has only gotten worse this past year and will further worsen without counter-measures. In 2019 alone, 1.4 million people that included 230,000 children had died of TB. TB is becoming more fatal and difficult to treat with available drugs because of TB's growing resistance to our drugs. In Canada, TB patients in Inuit communities are 290 times more than in non-indigenous community due to poor policy implementations. Resources that were normally used to fight TB have been diverted to respond to COVID-19 making it more difficult to diagnose TB and harder for TB patients to have access to essential healthcare. 

TB-affected people are in desperate need of hope, support, and solutions now more than ever. TB REACH, founded in 2010, supports community-led initiatives globally.  Canada has been a global supporter and leader in the fight to end TB and a leading investor in TB REACH. To mitigate the devastating impacts that COVID-19 is having on TB-affected people, Canada must maintain its investment in TB REACH by committing CAD$85 million over five years. We must support the fight to end TB and not let past progresses unravel.

Zohra Khatoon,

Ottawa, Ontario, K1Y4P9