New York: India and 21 other countries, worst hit by worldwide tuberculosis epidemic, urgently need extra financial assistance to meet the global targets of detecting and successfully curing a large percentage of TB patients by 2005, the UN health agency has said.

Experts working with World Health Organisation (WHO) estimate that the total cost of TB control is $ 1.2 billion a year.

Three quarters of the funding has already been covered by the countries affected, donors and other sources. The remaining $ 300 million each year are urgently needed to meet the target.

WHO's World Health Assembly has set global targets of detecting 70 per cent of TB patients and successfully curing 85 per cent of these patients by 2005.

"This is a race against time," said Dr J W Lee, director of WHO's TB Department. "Poor control practices in many countries and the TB/HIV co-epidemic mean that urgent action needs to be taken to control TB."

"This funding gap is clearly identified and affordable," Lee said. "If we are to meet these targets, we must act now."

Other worst affected countries are Pakistan, Bangladesh, China, Russia, Afghanistan, Brazil, Cambodia, Congo, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Kenya, Myanmar, Nigeria, Peru, Philippines, South Africa, Tanzania, Thailand, Uganda, Vietnam and Zimbabwe.

Preliminary figures for patients treated in 2000, the last year for which figures are currently available, show that on average the cure rate in the high burden countries has reached 84 per cent, which is extremely close to the target of 85 per cent. This is a significant increase from previous years.

PTI