According to the statistics provided during 'Satyamev Jayate', a startling number of people are affected by Tuberculosis, or TB in India. "Over 30 crore Indians carry the virus for the disease, whereas around 40 lakh are currently suffering from it," the show revealed.

The latest episode of Aamir Khan's show tackled the issue of growing numbers of people suffering from Tuberculosis, a typically lung disease. It is spread through the air when people who have an active TB infection cough, sneeze, or otherwise transmit respiratory fluids through the air.

Aamir spoke at length about the problems in early detection of the disease, which results in patients taking the wrong medication for over six months.

During the course of the show, however, Aamir revealed that one of the best "vaccines" against TB was proper and nutritious diet. "Over 36 per cent of Indian women, and over 34 per cent of Indian men suffer from malnourishment, which results in weakened resistance powers against TB as well as other diseases," revealed Aamir Khan on the show.

In a first, Aamir invited Bollywood actor and friend Salman Khan to talk about how the disease had affected him personally.

In an emotional speech, Salman revealed that his grandmother suffered and died of TB, unable to recognise her own young son (noted script-writer Salim Khan). Aamir also revealed that Salman has been helping needy TB patients with funds for surgeries, medicines, etc.

When asked why he didn't respond to the letters, phone calls by the doctors and patients who wanted to thank him, Salman responded in jest, "Arrey I don't even reply to texts from Aamir Khan."

@satyamevjayate

India has the highest number of TB patients in the world. Is there anything we can do about it? Ask Aamir #MumkinHai #tickingTimeBomb

10:02 AM - 26 Oct 2014

Today’s episode was on the spread TB in India. Aamir highlighted how TB can spread and what it does to one’s body. Read on to know more…

Aamir Khan was lauded for highlighting the bold topic of homosexuality last week. This week, the perfectionist Khan talked about the dreaded disease of TB or Tuberculosis, which is affecting lives of several people in India. Did he do justice to the topic? We tell you…

The Good

TB is a disease which has been in India since ages, but people are not fully aware of its ill-effects. However, Aamir aptly brought the topic into the much needed focus.

It was sensible on Aamir’s part to put forth the topic through story telling. With a doctor sharing a tale about his sister (also doing her MBBS) who passed away at the age of 24 due to TB, one would definitely realise that TB is certainly not a small disease. Joining him was Prathamesh and Deepti, who shared stories about their struggle with TB.

Personal experiences aside, a concept makes sense a whole lot more when put forth by professionals. Dr Zarir Udwadia from Hinduja Hospital brought forward the various types of TB one can suffer. For example, there is multi-drug resistance tuberculosis the treatment and medications are stronger and much expensive as opposed to normal TB. Worse than this is XDR or extremely drug resistant TB or TDR — totally drug resistant TB. On these, none of the medications work.

Dr Anurag Bharghav said that to fight TB, we first need to look at facts which lead to it. One of them is malnutrition which affects 36% of Indian women. In New York too TB cases rose in the ’90s. To tackle this, the government increased the funds for treatment of TB and volunteers went from street to street to provide medication to the citizens. A nurse called Rebecca also spoke about her journey during this period in NY. She had to provide medication to drug dealers, criminals, etc. during this time but her aim was to make sure they got it on time without caring about their profession.

Problems in government’s TB treatment was also highlighted. RNTCP – a free service to detect TB and treat it. It has benefited over 1 crore people as of now. But is it effective on the advanced levels of TB? A doctor highlights the fact that these days, TB spreads very quickly and it is difficult to diagnose what kind of tuberculosis it is. Here are a few problems in government’s program of treatment of TB at the grass root level: Alternate Day Therapy, Timing of DOTS centre (the timings are between 9 am to 2 pm to take the medications), shortage of dosage, poor monitoring and of course corruption.

Superstar Salman Khan, who is quite close to Aamir was also on the show today and shared with the audience how his grandmother was also suffering from TB. His father was only 7 years old. She used to go to Nanital for her treatment and one day after coming back from the treatment, she was unable to recognise her own son i.e. Salman’s father. Salman also helps several TB patients by providing them financial help. He even felicitated several volunteers who are working towards eradicating TB from India.

The Bad

There wasn’t any. We have often seen how the show gets repetitive, but this episode didn’t.

Verdict

Today’s episode was an engaging one. it was a commendable attempt by Aamir to bring forward the much ignored topic of TB. What say peeps?

by Vinod Talreja