9 Current Affairs Facts on Tribal TB Initiative and Tribal Population in India

Under the TB Mukt Bharat Initiative by 2025, Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan inaugurated the “Tribal TB Initiative” on March 26, 2021. The Ministry also published a guidance note on Joint Action Plan for the elimination of Tuberculosis (TB), a Special Edition of Tribal Ministry’s Publication ‘ALEKH’ on TB, and a document on Tribal Tuberculosis (TB) Initiative.

Some Features and Facts about the Tribal population and initiative:

1. In India, almost 104 million tribal population lives, across 705 tribes, accounting for 8.6 % of the country’s population.
2. The poor living standards like physical remoteness, malnutrition, and lack of hygiene lead to the tribal population getting vulnerable to TB. 177 tribal districts were identified as High-priority districts that are vulnerable.
3. The Joint plan will primarily focus on 161 districts initially across 18 states which will include deploying improved vulnerability mapping techniques and organization of sensitization and capacity-building workshops for volunteers.
4. There would also be periodic TB active case finding drives and provision of TB Preventive Therapy (IPT) to the identified vulnerable population and develop long-term mechanisms for vulnerability reduction.
5. Linkage of the NIKSHAY Portal of MoHFW and Swasthya Portal of the M/o Tribal Affairs will boost data compilation on Tuberculosis and pave way for efficient and convergent actions.
6. The union territories of Lakshadweep and the district of Badgam in Jammu & Kashmir have been declared TB Free on World TB Day 2021.
7. On State TB Index, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, and Himachal Pradesh were the top three best-performing states for tuberculosis control under the category of states with a 50 lakh population.
8. Tripura and Nagaland were best-performing in the category of states having less than 50 lakh population.
9. Dadra and Nagar Haveli, and Daman and Diu were selected as the best performing Union Territories.

Month: Current Affairs - March, 2021