Hindustan Times: India’s Drug-Resistant TB Problem: When Silence, Delays, and Half-Measures Cost Lives

15 January 2026

Hindustan Times: Opinion piece, authored by Chapal Mehra, public health specialist, New Delhi and Zarir Udwadia, consultant physician, Hinduja and Breach Candy Hospitals, Mumbai

India likes to describe its TB response in the language of ambition. Elimination targets, global leadership, mission-mode action are catchphrases. Yet drug-resistant TB (DR-TB) in India tells a different story: delayed diagnosis, uneven treatment, biased data systems, and an absence of transparency. If TB is India’s unfinished business, DR-TB is its most obvious blind spot.

India undeniably has the scientific knowledge, clinical expertise, and manufacturing capacity to confront DR-TB. What remains uncertain is whether it has the urgency to act with the speed and seriousness the disease demands. It responds to early detection, uninterrupted treatment, social support, and hard accountability.

History will not judge India by the ambition of its targets, but by the reality of its outcomes. The longer DR-TB remains on the margins of national attention, the heavier that judgment will be.

Read the full opinion piece here.

Source: Hindustan Times