2 March 2010 - The Ministry of Health has welcomed US$3million of assistance provided by the Three Diseases Fund (3DF) through the World Health Organization for the provision of anti-TB drugs to help the fight against tuberculosis, one of the priority diseases in Myanmar.

“With continuing support of donors, the Three Diseases Fund has been supporting the National Tuberculosis Programme since 2006 and allocated US$900,000 for anti-TB drugs in 2008 and 2009” said Mr. Philippe Allen, Chair of the Three Diseases Fund Board.

The drugs, funded by donors to the Three Diseases Fund, Australia, Denmark, the European Commission, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom, will be distributed to the National Tuberculosis Programme (NTP)’s stores in upper and lower Myanmar according to the drug needs of registered TB patients. Township TB Units, through which the patients receive anti-TB drugs, obtain the drugs from relevant State and Divisional TB Units quarterly.

“More funds were committed to assisting the fight against the three priority diseases in Myanmar, and the 3DF has awarded an additional US$3million to assist the NTP in providing freely available drugs to TB patients” he underlined.

Kyats 90 million has also been pledged for TB drugs for 2009-2010 by the Ministry of Health.

A senior officer from the NTP said that the assistance of anti-TB drugs was substantial for the large number of TB patients in Myanmar. In 2008, 131,367 patients were treated for Tuberculosis.

“With this help of 3DF, we acquired the drugs from the Global Drug Facility (GDF) and will be able to provide medicine to 140,000 new TB patients for one year in 2010. This will help reduce the transmission of TB and the morbidity and mortality rates across Myanmar” Dr. Sithu Aung, medical officer of the National TB Control Programme said.

The assistance, that also includes in-country distribution costs of the drugs, was to fill the funding gap of anti-TB drugs in Myanmar after the GDF completed its assistance at the end of 2009. The GDF has supported the National TB Control Programme with TB drugs from 2002 to 2009.