WHO: Stable tuberculosis arises because of incompetence of doctors
Last reviewed: 17.10.2021
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The spread of drug-resistant pathogens in India was facilitated by the unprofessional behavior of doctors. This was announced by the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) anti-tuberculosis program, Mario Raviglione.
According to Raviglione, in the first place it is a question of errors of medical workers leading private practice. To such professionals are drawn from 50 to 70% of Indians who have developed a cough. "The problem is that many private practitioners are simply incompetent," the WHO representative said.
He noted that these doctors do not adhere to the tuberculosis treatment regimen recommended by the international organization when the patient takes 4 different drugs within six months. Patients are assigned a smaller number of pharmaceuticals, which leads to the formation of drug resistance in infectious agents. On the contrary, excessive therapy increases the toxic effect on the body and leads to unjustified costs for treatment.
In the sample survey, which involved approximately one hundred private practitioners from Mumbai, it was found that these doctors assigned 80 different regimens for taking anti-TB drugs to patients.
Microbiologist of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences Sarman Singh said that in private hospitals patients are treated for tuberculosis without a laboratory verification of the diagnosis. Ravigione also noted that in a private practice diagnostic test systems that have not been approved by WHO are often used. Part of the diagnostic errors in their application reaches 50%.
As stated earlier, at the beginning of 2012 at the Hinduji Hospital in Mumbai, 12 cases of tuberculosis, resistant to absolutely all medications from this infection, were recorded. The first samples of mycobacterium tuberculosis, resistant to any combination of known pharmaceutical agents, were isolated from biomaterials of sick Indians in October 2011.