Shimla: Health Minister Kaul Singh Thakur said the state government was a frontrunner in TB control activities and has created a good impression at national level as its health indicators are the best in the country. Addressing the closing ceremony of the two-day workshop of Zonal Task Force (north zone) organised by the state task force, state TB cell and the national health mission in collaboration with the Central TB Division, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, here on Sunday, Thakur said India had over 1/4th of the total TB cases in the world. As many as 28 lakh cases and 4.8 lakh deaths in one year in India tell the story of the disease burden. Since 1997, more than 19 million patients in India had been given treatment and over 3.4 million lives saved, he added. The Health Minister the state had two DRTB centres at Dharampur and Tanda for treatment of the MDR and two more centres were coming up in the IGMC, Shimla and Zonal Hospital, Mandi this year. The State has successfully launched daily regimen for TB patients and 868 patients had been put up on daily regimen across the state. The Health Minister said the state had intermediate reference laboratories at TB sanatorium Dharampur besides two CDST labs functioning at the IGMC and Tanda. He said nine machines were fully functional in hospitals of the state and three more such machines had been approved for Kinnaur, Lahaul-Spiti and Kullu. tns