TB in Mining Sector in Southern Africa (TIMS)

Challenge

Miners are at high risk of developing TB due to poorly ventilated work conditions. Nearly 500,000 miners from South Africa are at high risk of contracting Tuberculosis.  Each miner infected with TB carries the risk of passing this life-threatening disease to his family and community.

Additionally, financial hardships, poor social conditions and cross country movement of miners increases the risk of infection and makes infected individuals harder to track. To address these factors, a targeted, community-centric and demand creation approach is required to treat infected miners and their families who are currently at risk of developing TB at any stage of their life.

Our Approach

IRD South Africa under a ten country initiative called TB in the Mining Sector in Southern Africa programme (TIMS) is implementing community mobilization campaigns and door to door TB screenings in South Africa and Zimbabwe.

The project is conducting activities based on context-specific surveillance model to screen and refer 86,000 miners and their family members to hospitals for timely initiation of TB treatment and continuity of care. The activities are specifically designed to educate and provide treatment through community engagement sessions, on spot screening during the imbizos (i.e. traditional gatherings), road shows and household visits.

Impact

Around 13000 miners and their family members have been screened in Zimbabwe and 37,000 people have been screened in South Africa. Over 150 miners including their relatives are diagnosed with TB and referred to hospitals for treatment.