Dear Editor,
As a physician with Doctors Without Borders I am thrilled the Canadian government has funded TB Reach for five years in conjunction with the UN.
TB Reach will provide funding for the detection of untreated TB, using the new Xpert test that can give results in hours instead of days.
There are 2 billion people living with TB or tuberculosis and about 1.4 million of those die every year.
That is horrific enough. What is less commonly known is that one quarter of people with HIV/AIDS will die of untreated TB, a disease that can be cured with oral antibiotics.
This year the WHO announced its Save A Million Lives campaign, aimed at reducing those deaths by 1 million between now and 2015.
To achieve that, Canada must use its leadership as the first and only major funder of TB Reach to push further for dedicated funding for detecting TB in people with HIV/AIDS.
I hope that on my next overseas posting I will see my patients receiving the testing and treatment that they need — and deserve — and I urge the Canadian government to once again take the lead with this issue.
Dr. Cassandra Arnold
Calgary
