Health experts at World Health Organization are promoting the use of a new diagnosis procedure, which has the capacity of reducing the time required in locating the drug-resistant tuberculosis by more than 2 hours.

One of the WHO officials said that more than half of the cases of TB reported in the world every year, account to those in Asia alone.

The TB onset is very difficult to be located in the patients and they are made to take medications for more than 2 years.

The disease, in most circumstances, proves to be fatal.

Catharina van Weezenbeek, Regional Adviser on TB for the WHO in the Western Pacific region, said that the latest technology provides scope for the sensitization of the TB patients towards the early detection.

"These tools are very expensive, but the scale up should be carefully planned. That requires money, training, infrastructure", she added.

She shared the facts at a meeting held at Philippines, organized by the WHO.

A number of delegates from countries including Papua New Guinea, China, Vietnam, Philippines, Cambodia and Laos took part in the event.

As per the figures released by WHO, as many as 120,000 cases of MDR-TB are reported annually in the Western Pacific region.