Malawi is running out of tuberculosis drugs, with health officials warning that stocks will dry up by the end of September – this just months after the WHO announced that the country had successfully reduced TB cases by 40% over the past decade.
The Guardian reports that in March, the WHO’s country representative, Dr Neema Rusibamayila Kimambo, said Malawi had seen a high rate of success in treating TB and a significant reduction in the number of deaths.
But pulverised by the cuts in aid from the US, UK and other donors, the Health Ministry has now been forced to warn of low stocks of first-line TB medicines, meaning patients may find their treatment disrupted or even terminated.
Dr Samson Mndolo, Malawi’s Health Secretary, attributed the critical shortages to disruption in the global supply of pharmaceutical ingredients, worsened by declining international support and aid. He said newly diagnosed patients may be denied access to the standard drug regimens.
Some hospitals have already reported having to borrow stock from other facilities.
In Blantyre, TB officer Lackson Namuku Gama said the district pharmacy had no stocks at all of the TB drugs to distribute to the 45 health facilities it supplies.
“We registered zero stock of the TB drug at our district pharmacy, especially the RHZE, which is the main drug used in the initial phase of treatment, and have also run out of the cartridges used for diagnosis of TB samples.”
He said they had been forced to stop all testing.
A Malawi health rights activist, Maziko Matemba, called on the government to intervene.
“It is high time African countries started manufacturing some of these drugs,” he said.
Despite the decline in cases, TB remains a public health concern in Malawi and has been hit badly by the drop in international funding, with an estimated incidence rate of 119 per 100 000 people and a mortality rate of 38.6 per 100 000.
The CDC says 47% of TB cases in Malawi are co-infected with HIV.
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