National Tuberculosis Institute

An important landmark in the fight against TB in India was the launching of Mass BCG Campaign soon after independence. This turned out to be one of the biggest public health campaigns, penetrating into the vast interior rural areas with a health education component. An important offshoot of this campaign, was the pooling together of experiences resulting from international co-operation comprising,International Tuberculosis Campaign, World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund(UNICEF). Later on a meeting of the minds between the Late Dr PV Benjamin, the doyen in the field of TB control and the then Adviser on TB to the Government of India and Dr HT Mahler of WHO and their concerted efforts made a lasting impact on TB control programme.

The results of tuberculin tests carried out as a part of the Mass BCG Campaign led to the launching of “National Sample Survey on TB in India” – a pioneering work and also one of the largest survey of its kind undertaken by the Indian Council of Medical Research, New Delhi. The findings of these two surveys were rather startling and overturned the then prevailing myth that TB was mainly an urban problem. Since nearly 80% of the population in India lived in about 5,60,000 villages, all of a sudden the TB problem loomed large as a colossus. After recovering from the striking effect of the above findings, TB workers in India under the guidance of the Dr PV Benjamin and Dr Mahler,initiated planning to fight the TB situation with determination and farsightedness.