New Delhi, Mar 23 (PTI) Stop TB Partnership Executive Director Lucica Ditiu on Thursday lauded the Indian government's recently launched 'Ni-kshay Mitra' programme of adopting tuberculosis patients and providing them nutritional and medical support, and said she would want to adopt 10 such patients in the country in the coming days.

She exuded confidence that India will be able to end the prevalence of tuberculosis (TB) by 2025 if the political commitment is maintained.

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"... I want to say that I have only applauds for India for the plans and activities that are put in place to end TB. And then putting efforts into having a lot of things that are unique in the world, starting with live data for TB, a unique platform which gives opportunity to anyone to access it and see the number of people with TB diagnosed and treated in India," she told media.

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On the importance of leadership in prioritising health in any country, Ditiu said leaders should care for the health of their people.

"We would like to have clones of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in every single country to care and call for strong action to save lives of people with TB... If the effort is not driven by the political leadership of the country, there will be no agenda that will be sustained and maintained. The margins can do a lot but they will never ever achieve a big impact at the country level. So, we actually would like to see the same type of leadership in other countries," she said.

India had recently launched the Ni-kshay Mitra programme where anyone can adopt TB patients and take care of their medicine, food and even vocational expenses.

In a short time, nearly 1 million TB patients have been adopted.

Terming the concept innovative, the Stop TB Partnership official said no other country in the world came up with such a fantastic idea.

"It brings the empathy and love for the person near you and the desire to help. I challenge all the countries in the world to put that in place. Because you will never understand what it means to have TB, as much love and empathy we have, till you really know somebody.

"I also want to adopt 10 people with TB in India as part of this effort. India also has this amazing plan of providing Rs 500 to every single person with TB per month. There is no other country in the world that gives even half a rupee per month," she noted.

On the greatest challenges for India to eliminate TB by 2025, Ditiu said it is very important to maintain the political commitment.

"... So, we are thrilled that for the last six-seven years, India is focused on TB. So, the biggest challenge will be to maintain this political commitment," she said.

She further highlighted the need to decentralise it as much as possible, the services, and to ensure that everybody goes closer to people with TB in the periphery, in the smaller communities, in the villages, in the small parts of cities.

"If these three things will go with the ambition and tools that we see, I really have no hesitation that India will eradicate the disease by 2025," she added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)