Already struggling with HIV for decades, trying to snatch life from the deadly ailment, the sub-Saharan Africans now have yet another monster to fight away — tuberculosis.
The region being undoubtedly the most affected by the virus, inhabited by just over 12 percent of the world’s population, Africa is estimated to have more than 60 percent of the AIDS-infected population! The poor areas of the sub-Saharan Africa are more vulnerable.
To worsen the situation, the rates of drug-resistant TB in rising in areas where the prevalence of HIV is high. HIV itself is to be blamed for the TB outbreak. With the immune systems of at least a quarter of the population in some areas being destroyed by the virus, more and more people are not only developing TB, but also are spreading across its healthy neighbors.
In the slums of the country, people live crammed together in tin shacks, and this eventually lead to the spread of TB. What adds to the graveness of the crisis is the existing tests’ failure to spot TB before it is too late. The health care systems and infrastructure in the region there cannot cope with it.
Today, lack of proper treatment kills 90 percent of HIV-infected people within months of contracting TB! It seems, proper health care systems and effective awareness programs can effectively answer the prevailing, rather worsening, scenario in the sub-Saharan Africa.
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