The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA), last week, approved the extension of the ongoing World Bank assisted revised national TB control programme (RNTCP) for another five years from October 1, 2005 to September 30, 2010.

The direct benefit of the project will be treatment of 53.24 lakh TB patients during the project period. Of this at least 45.25 lakh patients would be cured. This will result in averting at least 9.6 lakh deaths of which 4.8 lakh would be adults.

The RNTCP was introduced in 1993. In 1997 the World Bank assisted RNTCP was launched at a project cost of Rs 749.28 crore and included a World Bank component of Rs 604.9 crore to cover a population of 271 million (1991 census) in 102 Short Course Chemotherapy (SCC) districts and strengthen another 203 SCC districts for introduction of the RNTCP at a later stage over a period of five years.

The project was later extended upto March 2004 to cover a total population of 70 crore under the revised strategy and further extended till September 30, 2005 to cover a population of 73 crore within the original project cost.