Malawi

Malawi is a long and narrow country in Africa with a population of 18 million people. As reported by the WHO, Malawi is in the top 20 countries with the highest estimated numbers of incident tuberculosis cases among people living with HIV. More than 15.000 TB cases were notified in 2016. However, TB treatment success rates were more than 80% in 2015, which means a practical and valid TB solution is essential to fight TB in Malawi.

The Delft Approach

Because more than 80% of the population live in rural areas, our mobile OneStopTB clinics are an effective way to screen people on TB. We provided as many as 7 OneStopTB clinics, making this our biggest OneStopTB project in East-Africa yet.

In October 2017 all 7 trucks arrived in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi. Since Malawi consists of 7 regions, every region now has their own mobile OneStopTB clinic.

All 7 OneStopTB clinics have an X-ray compartment with a control room, a separate laboratory for the GeneXpert test (both air-conditioned), teleradiology and computers with our CAD4TB software. The trucks are all self-sufficient, thanks to the solar roof panels, batteries, generator and water supply.

Several trainings were carried out to educate all personnel about the hardware and software. This includes application and user training on the OneStopTB clinic and Easy DR, IT training (PACS and CAD4TB) and technical assistance and capacity building.