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AKARTA: After 10 years of holding status as the world’s third-largest country with tuberculosis, this year Indonesia dropped to fifth rank, an official says.

Health Minister Endang Sedyaningsih said that the rank drop was a Millennium Development Goal achievement. She said that in 2010, the number of people with tuberculosis numbered 300,000, with deaths caused by tuberculosis reaching 61,000, or 169 people per day.

“The number is relatively high and we are trying to reduce it through the tuberculosis national program,” she said as quoted by tempointeraktif.com.

She said that the handling of tuberculosis cases was already put in the ministry’s 2010-2014 national strategy. The availability of medicine from hospitals to community health centers also helps push down the number of tuberculosis patients. — JP