Adakhan Mamadaliev spent 35 years in prison. When he was finally released, he did not want to live. A tuberculosis diagnosis only deepened that feeling, and for a long time, he saw no way forward. But something changed when he found his way to a shelter in southern Kyrgyzstan. He found purpose, community, and a reason to keep going.
His story is not unique. Across Kyrgyzstan, thousands of people are navigating a disease that is as much about social vulnerability as it is about medicine. In 2022, more than 4,000 new tuberculosis cases were recorded in the country, with over 700 involving multiple drug-resistant forms that require consistent treatment and support for up to eighteen months. Behind every number is a person, and behind every person is a story shaped by poverty, stigma, and isolation.
Defeating tuberculosis in this context demands far more than clinical solutions. It requires rebuilding trust, restoring dignity, and creating systems that reach everyone, including those who have been left furthest behind.
A Health System Being Rebuilt From the Inside
Significant changes are underway in how tuberculosis is being detected, tracked, and treated across Kyrgyzstan. A Unified Medical Information System is being developed to bring all patient health data into a single digital platform, making medical services more transparent, efficient, and accessible regardless of where a person lives. This effort is part of the joint programme implemented by WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, and UNDP, on digital health transformation in the Kyrgyz Republic, funded by the Joint SDG Fund, and reflects a broader national commitment to modernizing health care at its core.
Laboratory systems are being upgraded, AI-powered diagnostic tools are being introduced, and modern X-ray equipment has been installed in regions that previously had little access to advanced medical technology. Medical personnel across the country are being trained to work with these new systems. The Ministry of Health has been clear about the vision driving all of this.
"We aim to harness technologies and make medical care available to every citizen," said Minister Erkin Checheibaev.
This is not modernization for its own sake. It is an effort to build something more durable: a health care system that is sustainable, human-centered, and capable of reaching people wherever they are.
Shelters: Where Healing Goes Beyond Medicine
Technology, however, can only go so far. For many tuberculosis patients in Kyrgyzstan, the hardest part of the disease is not the treatment itself but the isolation that surrounds it. Families distance themselves. Communities pull away. People disappear into silence.
That is what makes the shelters so significant. Established with support from civil society organizations and international partners, these spaces offer something that no diagnostic machine can provide: the feeling of being welcomed.
Elmira Karimova, coordinator of the Public Foundation "Plus" in southern Kyrgyzstan, understands this from the inside. She went through tuberculosis herself, losing loved ones along the way before finding her own path through. Today, she coordinates a shelter where patients receive housing, food, medicine, and psychological support. Every day begins with warmth and human connection. "When a person starts breathing again," she says, "it is a miracle."
Another patient, whose name has been changed to Nail, left his own home after his diagnosis became known, choosing to distance himself rather than put his grandchildren at risk. Stigma, he discovered, could be as painful as the disease itself. But at the shelter, something shifted. "I thought tuberculosis was a disease of the past," he reflected. "And here, in the 21st century, it is still with us. But if there is faith, help, and a place where you are welcome, the disease can be defeated."
Bringing It All Together
What is emerging in Kyrgyzstan is not a single program or intervention but a layered response to a complex problem. Access to quality diagnostics and treatment is being expanded in remote areas. Legal aid is being made available to vulnerable patients. Educational programs for medical students are being redesigned to reflect new realities. Government institutions, civil society organizations, and international partners are working in closer coordination than before, with the patient at the center of every decision.
The goal, as those working across this system describe it, is to ensure that no one faces tuberculosis alone, whether they are in a city clinic, a remote village, or a shelter in the south of the country.
The patients themselves perhaps say it best. The most important medicine, they will tell you, is not only the pills. It is knowing that someone sees you, that someone is there, and that you still have a place in the world.
For Adakhan, that knowledge made all the difference. "I used to exist," he says. "And now I live."
Originally published by UNDP Kyrgyzstan.
Note:
All joint programmes of the Joint SDG Fund are led by UN Resident Coordinators and implemented by the agencies, funds, and programmes of the United Nations development system. With sincere appreciation for the contributions from the European Union and Governments of Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Republic of Korea, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland for a transformative movement towards achieving the SDGs by 2030.
