• Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Dr. Harsh Vardhan released the annual TB Report 2020 through a virtual event on 24 June. Also, a Joint Monitoring Mission (JMM) report, a manual on Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) to TB patients under NIKSHAY system, a Training Module, and the quarterly newsletter NIKSHAY Patrika was released.
• The report stated that around 24.04 Lakh TB patients have been notified in the year 2019. The new reports amount to a 14% increase in TB notification as compared to the year 2018.
• Centre is to achieve near-complete on-line notification of TB patients through the NIKSHAY system.
• There occurred a reduction in the number of missing cases to 2.9 lakh cases against more than 10 lakhs in 2017.
• Notifications by the Private sector increased by 35% with 6.78 lakh TB patients notified.
• It also reported that the proportion of children diagnosed with TB has increased to 8% in 2019 against 6% in 2018, due to easy availability of molecular diagnostics.
• The provision to test HIV for all notified TB patients has increased from 67% in 2018 to 81% in 2019.
• Treatment services have expanded and resulted in a 12% improvement in the treatment success rate of notified patients to 81% in 2019 against 69% in 2018.
• More than 4.5 lakh DOT Centers provide treatment covering almost every village across the country.

NIKSHAY Patrika has expanded the provision of four DBT schemes of the programme namely:

• Nikshay Poshan Yojana (NPY) to TB patients
• Incentive to Treatment Supporters
• Incentive to Private Providers
• Transport incentive to TB patients in the notified tribal areas