Tuberculosis (TB) has officially overtaken COVID-19 to become the number one infectious disease globally, data from the World Health Organization (WHO) reveals.
Peak data from health bodies shows that although the number of people dying from the disease fell from 1.32 million in 2022 to 1.25 million in 2023, annual infections rose to around 10.8 million l last year.
In a report released Tuesday, the WHO also pointed out that last year alone, 8.5 million people were diagnosed with tuberculosis, the highest figure in a single year since it began tracking infections in 1995. .
These figures highlight the challenges in the global effort to eradicate the disease, which the report describes as a “distant goal”.
“The fact that tuberculosis still kills and sickens so many people is an outrage when we have the tools to prevent, detect and treat it,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters.
The UN agency says further progress and funding is needed to achieve significant milestones in reducing the burden the disease places on the health systems of nations around the world.
Middle- and low-income countries are currently dealing with the highest number of tuberculosis cases, nearly 98%, and are in critical need of funding.
In 2023, the gap between the estimated number of new cases and reported cases narrowed to about 2.7 million, down from COVID-19 pandemic levels of about 4 million in 2020 and 2021.