Tuberculosis will cost the world economy close to $1 trillion in lost economic output by 2030, unless countries step up efforts to fight the disease, according to a report launched today by the Global TB Caucus, a group of over 2,300 parliamentarians from 130 countries. The disease cost the world more than $600 billion from 2000 to 2015.

These are not doomsday figures, but the simple calculation of what the cost will be if we fail to beat this disease according to the timetable the world itself has set. The scale of the economic cost is striking, and it does not even include what might happen in relation to drug resistance.

According to the report, the most economically affected region will be Asia-Pacific ($573 billion from 2015 to 2030), followed by Africa ($303 billion), Europe and Central Asia ($64 billion), and the Americas ($42 billion).

At the current rate of progress, the SDG’s target of eliminating TB by 2030 will be missed by 150 years, and an additional 28 million people will die within 15 years, according to the report, which was produced by KPMG based on figures from WHO.

Read the source article on TB and the global economy by Gloria Pallares at Devex International Development