The Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, said on Friday that at least 600,000 cases of tuberculosis are recorded annually in the country.
Adewole said the situation is quite worrisome as five out six cases of tuberculosis escaped detection.
The stated these while flagging off a free mobile testing and treatment of the disease in Abeokuta, Ogun State.
The initiative is tagged: “Wellness on Wheel.”
He said Nigeria’s case represents the fourth largest burden of tuberculosis in the world.
According to him, early detection is crucial for proper treatment while undetected cases portend grave danger to the society.
Adewole said: “We are flagging off this initiative to improve tuberculosis cases detection in our country. Nigeria has about 600, 000 tuberculosis cases every year and we have the fourth largest burden of tuberculosis all over the world and we are number one in Africa.
“What is particularly worrisome is that we are only able to detect one out of six cases of tuberculosis. In terms of detection, Nigeria has scored the least in the world in terms of being able to pick tuberculosis cases.
“The danger is that tuberculosis is infective and the five out of six cases undetected will infect other people and therefore our mandate is to increase case detection, so that the five missing cases will be detected and treated, hence, this unique initiative called ‘Wellness on Wheel.’
“With this innovative idea, we can diagnose tuberculosis within a very short time, at most, two hours. We can do x-ray using this vehicle, we can also detect tuberculosis cases using generic test, we will also know if the case is drug resistance type or non drug resistance type.”
