Kuntanase (Ash), Aug 25, GNA - The Bosomtwe-Atwima-Kwanwoma District is likely to record 322 Tuberculosis (TB) cases by the end of this rear as against 42 in 3002, Dr K.K. Hussein, District Director of Health Services, has stated.

He said the figure was reached by calculating 200 cases out of every 100,000 people for the population of 161,000. Dr Hussein was speaking at a Health Management Information Sharing meeting of the District Health Management Team (DHMT) at Kuntanase. He attributed the rise in TB cases to poverty and stigmatisation, which discourage people with the disease from reporting for treatment. Dr Hussein said that the DHMT had trained health workers, chemical sellers, community-based volunteers under the surveillance programme to be paying frequent visits to patients on treatment and to support them to complete their treatment.

He denied that TB was caused by witchcraft or was a curse and attributed the erroneous notion to ignorance, which was a draw back to the control and cure of the disease.

Dr Hussein asked medical personnel to keep proper records of people with the disease in the district as well as those from other areas.

The District is among 20 other ones being sponsored by AYA, an NGO to establish Youth Foundation Centres for confidential counselling and discussions on family planning, sexually transmitted infections, HIV/AIDS, teenage pregnancies and rape.