Science

Every year, nearly 9 million people get diagnosed with tuberculosis and 3 million of them die from the disease. Tuberculosis was almost cured at the end of the 80s of the last century. Now, the disease is still going strong. Some specialists think that in the near future tuberculosis will practically become an incurable disease. The reason for that is because some countries are not serious towards treating the disease. Some other reasons include the disorganized counter-tuberculosis projects and the connection between tuberculosis and AIDS. However, the major issue in the medical world today is that the drugs are not effective. The most influential drugs are forty years old. Since we are talking about the drugs, we must mention that the old drugs can not help cure a disease such as kokh bacillus. The TB MDR can develop in a patient’s organism as a result of an irregular or incomplete treatment. Those kinds of patients are insensitive to first degree antibiotics-rhiphampitsin and isoniazid. They must be kept away from society because they can infect others with the MDR bacillus. According to recent statistics, the number of people in Armenia who have tuberculosis reaches 6,000. Compared to some countries, the number can be reduced. However the question is: what can be done towards accomplishing that?

The Ministry of Health is implementing a project aimed towards fighting against tuberculosis, along with a number of international organizations that are providing the financial means. The Armenian government alone can not reduce the number of patients diagnosed with tuberculosis, or cure the patients with MDR whose treatments last 1-2 years and cost $5-25,000 dollars depending on the stability. In the course of the next four years, the financial branch of the “Doctors without limits” organization will take care of all the expenses having to do with revealing, treating, care and supervision of the patients with MDR. “It is known that the poor are the ones that get diagnosed with tuberculosis, meaning that this is a disease that affects society,” says Director of the Mission Christian Ferien. “We are getting ready to work in the districts that are not in such good conditions, for example Malatia-Sebastia and Shengavit. Studies show that those districts have the highest percentage of tuberculosis cases.”

The budget for the project consists of $3,800,000 dollars, not including the salaries for the staff. According to Christian Ferrie, the project will enlist 300 patients. The effects of the drugs and not following up on their well-being are what add to the difficulties that the “Doctors without Limits” organization must overcome. First of all, in order for the patients to complete their treatment, social/psychological aid will be provided for the patients and their families. As for the drugs, there is no alternative. The whole world uses the same drugs of the last century. The first class patients will be able to get treated in February of next year. Besides construction, reconstruction and furnishings of the medical center within the framework of the project, the “Doctors without Limits” organization foresees making diagnostic divisions in Abovyan and Yerevan, as well as 35 beds in order to conduct intensive treatment in the anti-tuberculosis dispensaries. “If everything goes the way we have planned, we will have 200 fully recovered patients at the end of the project. The rest will continue to get treated.”

Fifty convicts diagnosed with tuberculosis

Since 2002, the Armenian branch of the international Red Cross has been implementing treatment for patients in the prisons and criminal prosecution centers. Until today, 260 patients have been treated in the newly built hospital for convicts. As a result, the number of convict patients has reduced. During the past five years, it has reduced from 4.1% to 3%. Today, the fifty convicts diagnosed with tuberculosis continue their treatments, however, 80% of these convicts leave the prison and stop treatment. Director of the Red Cross Tuberculosis Supervision Division Gegham Petrosyan says that they came face to face with this problem when there were changes made to the “Civil Code”. As a result of that, the time periods of imprisonment got shorter and almost half of the convicts got released. There were also infected patients among them. “We had suggested helping out the Ministry of Defense with treating tuberculosis, taking into consideration the fact that it is urgent to treat the soldiers in the armed forces. However, the Ministry of Defense refused to accept our offer. We were offering an effective method of diagnosis, microscopic investigation, examination of bacteria in the phlegm, but the Ministry wanted to conduct a phlurographic diagnosis, which was very expensive for us and so we just limited ourselves to taking photographs.”

Another organization also participating in this project aimed against tuberculosis is the German GTZ organization, which is being financed by the German government and the KLW bank. This organization is supplying our country with first degree antibiotic drugs and selling them around $20-70 when those drugs generally cost $500 dollars in all pharmacies. Armenia can not carry this burden on its shoulders. The country needs the help of other countries in treating tuberculosis. The budget of the Ministry of Health provides only 120,000 drams for the stationary treatment of one patient in the State Anti-tuberculosis dispensary in the city of Abovyan.