TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsClimate crisis may pose challenges to TB elimination
Poor environmental and social conditions may drive up TB transmission in high-burden Asian countries, while climate change-driven disasters can also potentially disrupt testing and treatment, health experts said.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
A woman and her children are tested for tuberculosis (TB) at a community health center (Puskesmas) on May 14, 2025, in Bandung, West Java. (Antara/Abdan Syakura)
H
ealth experts have called for faster tuberculosis prevention and response efforts, with the climate crisis potentially increasing people’s vulnerability to the disease and complicating its elimination, particularly in high-burden Asian countries such as Indonesia.
TB, a contagious bacterial infection that primarily attacks lungs, infected at least 10.7 million people and claimed 1.23 million lives in 2024. Much of the global burden is concentrated in Asia, with Indonesia accounting for 10 percent of cases, the second highest after India (25 percent).
The situation may be exacerbated by the climate crisis that drives frequent extreme weather and record-breaking heat, making TB increasingly difficult to control, according to Indian infectious disease specialist Subramanian Swaminathan.
Poor environmental and social conditions, such as overcrowding, poor ventilation, food insecurity and malnutrition, may drive up transmission and disrupt access to healthcare during extreme weather.
“With crowding, urbanization and mass gatherings, transmission becomes very, very fast,” Swaminathan said on July 9 on the sidelines of Asia-Pacific International Roche Infectious Disease Symposium (APAC-IRIDS) 2026 in Bangkok.
Mumbai was an example, he continued. People living in one of the world’s most densely populated cities rely heavily on air conditioning to fight off extreme heat, reducing ventilation and increasing the risk of TB transmission.
Swaminathan acknowledged evidence directly linking climate change to TB remained understudied, but researchers may not have long to study it: “My worry is that we don’t have too much time to figure all of this out before this becomes a significant problem.”
