GLOBAL HEALTH
‘The Biggest Monster’ Is Spreading. And It’s Not the Coronavirus.
Tuberculosis kills 1.5 million people each year. Lockdowns and supply-chain disruptions threaten progress against the disease as well as H.I.V. and malaria.
Dr. Giorgio Franyuti is usually in the remote jungles of Mexico diagnosing T.B. But since the pandemic, he has worked at a makeshift hospital treating coronavirus patients in Mexico City.Credit...Meghan Dhaliwal for The New York Times
By Apoorva Mandavilli
Published Aug. 3, 2020Updated Sept. 23, 2020
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It begins with a mild fever and malaise, followed by a painful cough and shortness of breath. The infection prospers in crowds, spreading to people in close reach. Containing an outbreak requires contact tracing, as well as isolation and treatment of the sick for weeks or months.
This insidious disease has touched every part of the globe. It is tuberculosis, the biggest infectious-disease killer worldwide, claiming 1.5 million lives each year.
Until this year, TB and its deadly allies, H.I.V. and malaria, were on the run. The toll from each disease over the previous decade was at its nadir in 2018, the last year for which data are available.
Yet now, as the coronavirus pandemic spreads around the world, consuming global health resources, these perennially neglected adversaries are making a comeback.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/03/health/coronavirus-tuberculosis-aids-malaria.html#click=https://t.co/6zRkcIvv1F
