Hyderabad: Tuberculosis spreads faster in packed settings and the transmission of the disease is high in large crowds if a person infected with TB is a part of it. The burden of TB in India is 2.2 million which is the largest and its spread has to be controlled to tackle the disease.
The Indian Council of Medical Research is looking at these aspects at the ground level as reports show that the disease burden continues to be high, despite various interventions by the government to control it.
A senior member of ICMR on condition of anonymity explained, “the reason to study prevalence of TB in ‘congregate’ settings is important to understand the rapidity of its spread and also how these conditions are creating more disease burden.”
The congregate settings like industries with workers exposed to silica, cotton mills, jute mills, mines and also those who are confined to old age homes, prisons, rehabilitation centres and night shelters.
Dr Gopi Krishna, senior pulmonologist explained, “The chances of transmission of bacteria increase when it is not identified early. Those who are living at home and working with people infected with TB in their work places are the ones who are prone to it. For this reason, it is said that 40 per cent of the Indian population has latent TB. This is because it has spread in environments where people are working together.”
The key is to identify the ailment early and treat the patient and keep them in isolation for at least three months. Dr S. Y. Bhatt, consultant pulmonologist exp-lained, “It does not mean keeping them away from the city or keeping them far away from their own people. It only means that they must be in a place where the number of people meeting them is limited and controlled. Those meeting them must follow hand washing hygiene properly , so that the spread of the bacteria is controlled.”
Congregate settings have been known to be a high risk environment for TB due to overcrowding, poor levels of nutrition and lack of hygienic conditions in their work environment. These factors add to the spread of the disease and tackling them by identifying the people early will help.
