WHO Report Says Tuberculosis Screening and Preventive Treatment Can Deliver Strong Returns
A WHO modelling study of four countries finds that TB screening plus preventive treatment can return up to US$ 54 for every dollar invested.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has published the second edition of an investment case arguing that tuberculosis (TB) screening combined with preventive treatment can bring large health and economic benefits. The document, titled "Funding a tuberculosis-free future", was published on 12 October, according to WHO’s publications page. It is a 17-page technical report prepared by the WHO team that works on HIV, TB, hepatitis and sexually transmitted infections.
The report presents a modelling study of the costs and benefits of TB screening together with TB preventive treatment, known as TPT. The study covers four countries: Brazil, Georgia, Kenya and South Africa. WHO says these are examples that other settings with a similar pattern of disease can learn from. The central finding is that relatively modest investments can produce significant health and economic gains in all four countries, with returns of up to US$ 54 for every dollar invested.
WHO says the purpose is to help countries make the case for more funding and to allocate it, so that screening and preventive treatment can be expanded. The report is linked to the targets that heads of state committed to at the 2023 United Nations High-Level Meeting on TB. The summary on the WHO page does not give country-by-country figures or the details of the modelling, which are in the full document, so those numbers are not reported here.
For readers in India, the background is relevant. WHO’s TB topic page says about half of all people with TB live in eight countries and lists India among them, although it does not give India’s share. The same page says roughly 10 million people fall ill with TB each year and about 1.5 million die from it. It adds that around a quarter of the world’s population is estimated to be infected with TB bacteria, but that most of those people will not develop the disease.
The WHO page explains the two interventions in the report. Screening involves health providers checking at-risk patients to rule out active TB, and WHO recommends rapid molecular diagnostic tests as the first test for people with signs and symptoms of TB. Preventive treatment is given to people who have TB infection but are not ill, to stop the disease from developing. It uses the same drugs as standard treatment for a shorter time, and WHO says newer options last one or three months compared with six months previously.
WHO’s page also notes that people with a latent infection have a lifetime risk of falling ill, which it puts at 5 to 10 per cent, although another part of the page gives a slightly wider range. The report is aimed at governments and health systems rather than individual patients. Anyone worried about symptoms should seek assessment at a qualified health facility.
