Kano State in northern Nigeria recorded 26,271 cases of tuberculosis (TB) in 2022.
In the last quarter of 2022, the state recorded 9,941 new cases of TB, the highest quarterly TB infection in Nigeria's history, the national tuberculosis control programme said in a statement on Thursday.
Ibrahim Gano, the programme's manager in Kano State, said that an untreated TB patient can transmit the disease to between ten and 15 people in a year.
To prevent the spread of the disease, Gano said that health officials in Kano, which is Nigeria's most populous state, have "deployed mobile TB screening tools and machines for TB screening and diagnosis."
Leading killer
He added that health care workers have been "trained on TB diagnosis, treatment and reporting."
TB is a contagious infection that usually attacks the lungs. It can also spread to other parts of the body, like the brain and spine.
TB is spread through the air when people with lung TB cough, sneeze or spit. A person needs to inhale only a few germs to become infected.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says every year, ten million people are infected with TB, with 1.5 million succumbing to the disease each year.
TB, which is preventable and curable, is the world's top infectious killer.
