On March 24, 2021 BNMT Nepal commemorated World TB Day 2021 with the theme, ‘The Clock is Ticking’ in central and district level conducting various activities in coordination with the government and through social media engagement.

For promoting TB awareness, BNMT distributed IMPACT TB project T-shirts in each of the project districts having the slogan, “TB free (district name)” with prints of animal/object/thing the district is most famous for.

In the light of COVID’19 and following the guideline from Nepal government which is to promote social distancing, BNMT Nepal cancelled/restricted some of the events with mass gatherings in the project districts. However, the day was marked with exciting events held in small scale in the project districts, organized in coordination with the local government and health offices.

In Pyuthan district, drone was utilized to fly the End TB banner showing the solidarity to end TB. Also, TB awareness orientation and interaction program for the priests was held in the famous pilgrimage of the district, Swargadwari. In Banke district, a folk duet performance aka ‘Lok dohori’ on the TB awareness lyrics was conducted in musical collaboration of the health workers, female community health volunteers and BNMT regional team together. In Bardiya and Chitwan districts, nutritious food packages were distributed to the TB patients and affected families in active presence and involvement of local government and the health representatives. In Mahottari district, traditional Nepali Mithila art was painted with TB awareness messages in the walls of Gaushala Primary Health Care Center (PHC) building and Ramgopalpur PHC premises. In Makwanpur district, inter-school quiz contest related to TB knowledge was conducted in Manahari Rural Municipality. And, brochures, banners and ‘parcha’ with TB messages were disseminated among these districts in coordination with the local/provincial government. At the central level, a team attended National Tuberculosis Control Center event, continuing our commitment and unity to fight against the disease. Moreover, a newspaper article titled, ‘Tackling TB amidst a pandemic’, written by our member Kritika Dixit, was published in weekly national newspaper, Nepali Times. The article can be accessed here.

Similarly, utilizing the social media, two videos, one showing the perspectives of TB stakeholders from the ground level as well as another showing the achievements of IMPACT TB phase I, were disseminated in support of our solidarity in the fight against the disease. Later, the perspective video was shared by Stop TB Partnership via its social media handles. The events of the districts were extensively covered by our social/online media throughout the day.