Almost two thirds of Filipinos have tuberculosis, and up to five million people are infected yearly, according to the country's recent national tuberculosis prevalence survey.

The disease kills 68 people daily in a country where the perception of the disease is so skewed that some medical practitioners refer to antituberculosis drugs as “vitamins for the lungs.”

According to the World Health Organisation, the Philippines ranks fourth in the world for the number of cases of tuberculosis and has the highest number of cases per head in South East Asia. The former health secretary, Senator Juan Flavier, has described …