The Centre for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ) has received a ZMW 30,000.00 donation from Atlas Mara Bank towards the alleviation of Tuberculosis (TB) patients in Choma.

Speaking at the handover ceremony held at the Atlas Mara house in Lusaka, the Bank’s Chief Executive Officer Mr. James Koni, expressed happiness for the partnership created with CIDRZ, that gives the bank an opportunity to support income-generating activities, for TB community health care workers in Choma district.

He further reminded the public that there are still many diseases that have been overshadowed by the advent of COVID-19 which have continued to claim the lives of people in Zambia, and TB is one of them.

“According to records, it is estimated that every year in Zambia 62,000 people fall ill to TB and 17,000 die of TB every year and that Zambia is one of the 30 TB high burden countries globally. We have also appreciated that CIDRZ runs several fellowship programmes aimed at building the capacity of Zambian researchers to participate in finding solutions to health challenges which has enabled the organisation to generate accurate analysis to inform policy which in turn fortifies local and international healthcare practices,” Mr. Koni said.

And receiving the donation on behalf of CIDRZ, Director of TB Programmes Dr. Monde Muyoyeta, expressed her excitement for the new partnership and looked forward to a more working relationship with Atlas Mara bank.

She explained that CIDRZ under its TB department has several projects and receiving the donation was the TB Local Organisation Network project (TBLON) funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The project aims at increasing the commitment of countries, build capacity of governance in civil societies and private sector to accelerate national program towards reaching global targets that were set by the United Nations high level meeting that was held in 2018.

“This is a 5-year project which started in March 2020 and is expected to end in 2025. The TBLON project is currently being implemented in nine (9) districts in Zambia which includes four (4) in Lusaka province and five (5) in Southern province with a specific objective of improving TB case detection and prevention in the districts that are being supported,” Dr Muyoyeta said.

She further explained that community health care workers play a very pivotal role in bridging the gap in situations where a shortage of qualified health care workers is identified. She explained that working with these people has for a long-time been based on voluntarism which makes it difficult for them to fully supplement the program efforts. Therefore there has been a call to begin the process of supporting these community health care workers who remain instrumental in TB management.

Some of the activities that shall benefit from this donation include TB sensitization activities, psycho-social counselling activities, screening and contact tracing activities and administering of TB treatment in the community which shall all supplement the promotion of healthcare for one of the most challenging infections of our time.

The bank which hosts one of the largest networks in Southern province hoped that the contribution shall equally benefit some of its clients who may be either directly or indirectly affected by TB. Mr koni also thanked Atlas Mara staff, shareholders and customers for the support that helps the bank to contribute to a healthy and wealthy society.

Globally about 10million people are detected of TB and 3million are missed or not diagnosed. This is due to a number of factors including the low levels of investment in TB and patient’s limited access to TB services. Treatment coverage in Zambia is estimated at 62%, meaning 38% of people are not diagnosed or put on treatment. The World Health Organisation (WHO) states that TB has the world leading of mortality rate and yet it is an infectious disease that is both preventable and curable.