Not All TB Sufferers Experience Symptoms Of Illness

Photo by Alexandr Podvalny on Unsplash

JAKARTA - Deputy Minister of Health Dante Saksono Harbuwono revealed the fact that not all people infected with tuberculosis or TB germs experience symptoms of illness.

Dante called the condition without symptoms of TB sufferers is called latent infection of tuberculosis.

"Latent tuberculosis infection is a condition in which the immune system of an infected person is unable to completely eliminate Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria but is able to control the TB bacteria, so that symptoms of TB disease do not appear," said Dante in his statement, Tuesday, February 15.

Therefore, Dante asked the public to pay attention to this condition. He said, people who are at risk such as household contacts with people with TB and people with HIV need to receive tuberculosis prevention therapy.

Unfortunately, the Ministry of Health noted that the provision of tuberculosis preventive therapy in 2021 to household contacts was only 0.2 percent and only 5 percent of people with HIV.

Dante said that this achievement is still far from the target of the national tuberculosis prevention therapy coverage target, which is 29 percent for household contacts and 40 percent for people with HIV.

"One of the challenges in providing TB prevention therapy is that there are still doubts about health workers, including doctors, in providing TPT for at-risk populations,"

Furthermore, Dante emphasized that the provision of tuberculosis preventive therapy is one of the important efforts towards the elimination of tuberculosis by 2030.

"To overcome the low coverage of tuberculosis prevention therapy, I expect the support and participation of all parties, including all members of health professional organizations in providing socialization and education about the importance of tuberculosis prevention therapy to all members of their respective professional organizations and to the entire community," he added. .