Aftab Ansari left his village to chase the dream of a better life in Mumbai. Then tuberculosis struck. After three years of treatment, Aftab was finally cured, but is still struggling to get his life back on track. Tuberculosis, a preventable and curable disease, affects people across the world, mostly the poor and malnourished. For survivors like Aftab, 32, traces of TB's trauma remain: poverty, debt and personal loss. This is his story.
India has the world’s highest burden of TB, with 27 percent of all global cases. It is also home to a quarter of all estimated patients with drug-resistant TB, a virulent strain that does not respond to first-line medication. Every year, more than a million people with TB in India are “missing,” meaning they are not diagnosed, treated or reported.
The government of India has set the ambitious goal of ending TB by 2025, five years ahead of the global target.
One person with active, untreated TB can spread the disease to as many as 15 people in a year. TB devastated Aftab’s family, which comes from a small farming community in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. Two of brothers and one sister also contracted TB. One brother and the sister died from the disease. “We came to Mumbai because I wanted a better life for my children,” Aftab said. “I will do whatever it takes to give them a future.”
Aftab’s wife and two children, aged 9 and 11, have moved back to the village, more than 1,000 km from Mumbai, until Aftab can pay his debts. He calculates it will take him at least two years. Every evening, after he ends his 10-hour shift, Aftab calls the family through a WhatsApp video conference – a rare moment of joy and laughter in his silent two-room cinder block house. “Pappa! Pappa!” the children scream in delight on the phone screen. “Are you obeying your mother?” Aftab asks. “Are you being good at school?”
Weakened by the disease, Aftab lost his job and was forced to spend all his savings, sell his wife’s jewels and withdraw his two children from school to pay for food and rent. His out-of-pocket medical bills from a private clinic piled up, so he took out loans and sank US$2,000 into debt, equivalent to 10 months’ salary.
The treatment for drug-resistant TB is especially harsh; side effects can include nausea, depression and kidney damage, among others. Determined to beat the disease, Aftab took his medicines every day, not allowing himself to succumb, despite the pain and the loneliness. Nitin Gharat, a government TB worker, helped Aftab during his ordeal. He brought him rice and legumes, dropped in for conversation in the evenings and provided emotional support.
India and the Global Fund are partnering to end TB through innovate solutions, including promoting a closer engagement between the private and public sector to find and treat more TB patients. Like many patients in India, Aftab sought private treatment when his symptoms first appeared, although the government provides TB diagnosis and treatment free of cost. To reach out to the private sector, private doctors are provided with incentives to encourage TB case notification, ensure treatment adherence and also treatment completion.
Failing to end TB will cost India more than US$250 billion through 2030, according to one study.
TB has an enormous impact on households and economies, particularly in lower- and middle-income countries. Besides the physical suffering and the hard treatment, the total cost of TB for patients and their families can be catastrophic in medical expenses, as well as income and productivity loss, contributing to a poverty trap.
Freeing families and communities from the burden of TB is just one reason we need to step up the fight to end the epidemic.
© 2026 The Global Fund
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