Tuberculosis: WHO warns of “crippling breakdowns” in response after funding cuts

The World Health Organization (WHO) has called for an urgent international public health response as tuberculosis (TB) funding cuts threaten to reverse two decades of progress in containing the world’s deadliest infectious disease.

The UN health agency said that it was particularly concerned about services in the world’s worst affected nations collapsing, allowing the respiratory disease to spread almost unabated.

More than a million people died from TB last year, but that number is expected to rise sharply as public health systems, particularly in Africa, are no longer able to diagnose, treat, and monitor the disease. WHO warned that the situation could quickly deteriorate, as 27 countries faced “crippling breakdowns” in their TB response as funding cuts hit every stage of detection, …