Environment

Successful fighting

DTE Staff

India is making dramatic progress in its fight against tuberculosis. The disease infects two million Indians each year -- one-quarter of all new cases globally. A treatment campaign that started in 1998 has now reached 40 per cent of India's population, up from two per cent at the outset, according to a report by the Indian government and Atlanta-based US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. Four-fifths of patients are now recovering after the treatment, with the death rates in treated areas slumping from 29 per cent to four per cent.