The Department of Health (DOH) is pushing to shorten the duration of treatment for tuberculosis from the previous six months to four months by the third quarter of 2023.
“We want to implement this short course four-month therapy by the third quarter of 2023… The WHO has recommended us to adopt the four months treatment for regimen–which is two months of certain list of drugs, and another two months of another set of drugs,” said DOH Secretary Teodoro "Ted" Herbosa in and advisory issued on Monday, July 03.
Herbosa stated that the shorter duration of drug use for tuberculosis will result in a "better success" of terminating the medication completely and stopping the spread of the infectious disease, which frequently damages the lungs.
An evaluation of the data at hand conducted by the WHO in 2021 says the shorter drug-susceptible tuberculosis regimen matched similarly to the existing standard regimen in terms of efficacy and safety.
According to data from the National Institutes of Health, a six-month therapy schedule will be established for people with drug-resistant TB, which can last up to 20 months,
The Philippines ranks fourth among the 30 high-TB burden countries – with an estimated 599,000 TB cases – and seventh among the high multidrug-resistant-TB (MDR-TB or DR-TB) burden countries, according to the World Health Organization.
