Researchers from Duke Kushan University (DKU) and Duke University published a paper in the medical journal The Lancet Public Health entitled “Ending TB in China: health system challenges”. China has made remarkable progress in reducing tuberculosis cases and deaths during the past three decades, but tuberculosis remains a persistent health issue in China.

A lack of coordination within TB control networks and an absence of policy coherence have hampered efforts to tackle the problem in China. According to the research paper, strengthened policy dialogue and a more integrated approach could overcome the issues and help China to meet its aim to end TB by 2030.

It is also possible the situation could worsen as a result of the COVID-19 pendemic, which had redirected resources and limited the capacity of routine health services delivery, such as TB control. The Chinese government has now made tackling infectious diseases a high priority again, which could provide an opportunity to strengthen TB control.

“To reverse this situation and get China back on track to eradicate tuberculosis, we recommend new dialogue among policy-makers on how to best tackle the problem and multi-level collaboration across areas of government and healthcare to improve health system administration, decision-making and use of resources,” said Shenglan Tang, Co-Director of Global Health Program at DKU, who was a co-author on the paper. 

Shitong Huan, Senior Program Officer in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Beijing office, who also co-wrote the paper, added, “The aim would be to meet the challenges of improving the quality of TB care and case management, better monitoring the provision of services and ensuring social protection for patients so they get the treatment and care they need.”

China’s experience could also be used to inform strategies for eradicating TB in other countries, according to the paper. 

“We believe the lessons learned in China and how we rectify them going forward, could be used as a model for other low-and-middle-income countries facing similar issues,’” said Dr. Qian Long, Assistant Professor of Global Health at DKU, the first author of this paper.