Russian Incidence of Tuberculosis Falls by 30% Over 10 Years

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – November 3, 2015)

Russian incidence of tuberculosis has fallen by 30 percent over the past 10 years, the country’s health minister said Friday, according to the RIA Novosti news agency.

Since 2005, incidence of tuberculosis infections in Russia has decreased by 30 percent, while the mortality rate from the disease has decreased twofold, Veronika Skvortsova said at the BRICS Health Ministers Meeting, according to RIA.

At the meeting, Skvortsova urged the BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – to unite in their fight against tuberculosis, adding that it is not possible to solve the problem in any one country amid globalization, increasing flows of migrants and the spread of drug-resistant tuberculosis.

Skvortsova offered at the meeting to conduct an international forum on the coordination of efforts against tuberculosis with the participation of BRICS countries and the World Health Organization (WHO).

The WHO last year called the high tuberculosis incidence in Russia and Belarus a “disaster,” according to Reuters.

In 2014, incidence of tuberculosis in Russia was 59.5 per 100,000 people, the TASS news agency reported at the time, citing data from the Health Ministry.