Every March, CDC joins the global community to recognize World Tuberculosis (TB) Day — an important moment to come together to renew a shared commitment to ending TB, an airborne disease that knows no borders.
This study aims to evaluate whether TB treatment failure among TB/HIV co-infected patients is a real failure. Methods: A prospective cohort study was conducted among 566 TB/HIV co-infected patients who started TB treatment in 12 townships in the upper Myanmar. Among the 566 participants, 16 (2.8%) resulted in treatment failure. Tuberculosis profile. Population 2017. Estimates of TB. Total budget (US$ millions).
In partnership with host-country governments, CDC is on the frontlines helping to sustain country-led efforts and to drive progress in this fight, bringing to bear a combination of scientific expertise and on-the-ground experience in diagnosing, curing, and preventing TB at home and around the world.
Leadership Statement
CDC leaders discuss progress to date in the fight against TB and the need for accelerated efforts to control this epidemic at home and abroad.
Message from the Director of the Center for Global Health Rebecca Martin, PhD and Director of the Division of Global HIV & TB Hank Tomlinson, PhD
“One hundred thirty-six years after the discovery of the mycobacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB), the global community has declared its intention to transform our approach to ending TB. It’s time, on this World TB Day, armed with new tools and new and renewed commitments, to move beyond incrementalism and drive down the burden of this ancient disease by finding, curing, and preventing all forms of TB.”
Click here for the full message.
“One hundred thirty-six years after the discovery of the mycobacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB), the global community has declared its intention to transform our approach to ending TB. It’s time, on this World TB Day, armed with new tools and new and renewed commitments, to move beyond incrementalism and drive down the burden of this ancient disease by finding, curing, and preventing all forms of TB.”
Click here for the full message.
Message from Hank Tomlinson, PhD, Director of CDC’s Division of Global HIV & TB
“We are at a key moment in the global fight against tuberculosis. Tremendous progress has been made and, yet, this preventable, curable infection still claims more lives than any other infectious disease or epidemic. As leaders come together on World TB Day and again at the United Nations High Level Meeting on TB in September, the time has come to double down on our TB prevention programs and investments. Today, we have the tools to turn the tide against the TB epidemic; the question is, do we have the political will? I’m convinced the answer is yes.”
“We are at a key moment in the global fight against tuberculosis. Tremendous progress has been made and, yet, this preventable, curable infection still claims more lives than any other infectious disease or epidemic. As leaders come together on World TB Day and again at the United Nations High Level Meeting on TB in September, the time has come to double down on our TB prevention programs and investments. Today, we have the tools to turn the tide against the TB epidemic; the question is, do we have the political will? I’m convinced the answer is yes.”
It’s Time to End TB: Changing the Course of the Global TB Epidemic
Despite being preventable and curable, tuberculosis (TB) is the leading killer from an infectious disease worldwide, claiming 4,400 lives every day (1.6 million lives in 2017 alone), and the leading cause of death among people living with HIV (PLHIV). In 2017, 10 million people became ill with TB disease, including nearly one million PLHIV and one million children. If TB is to be eliminated in the coming decades, efforts to find, cure, and prevent all forms of TB, especially among PLHIV and children—two of the groups most vulnerable to the disease—must be greatly accelerated. Read More
CDC on the Frontlines
CDC stands at the forefront of global efforts to find, cure, and prevent TB.
The End of Global TB external icon
“It starts on the ground…” CDC’s Dr. Sarita Shah recounts how the agency works with Ministries of Health to translate evidence into policy and practice. Dr. Shah is one of the many CDC experts devoted to the prevention and treatment of TB and HIV in more than 50 countries. external icon
“It starts on the ground…” CDC’s Dr. Sarita Shah recounts how the agency works with Ministries of Health to translate evidence into policy and practice. Dr. Shah is one of the many CDC experts devoted to the prevention and treatment of TB and HIV in more than 50 countries. external icon
IT’S TIME, END TB!
World TB Day commemorates the date in 1882 when Dr. Robert Koch announced his discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that causes TB. This year’s World TB Day theme “It’s TIME!” highlights CDC’s efforts to eliminate TB in the United States and around the world.
World TB Day commemorates the date in 1882 when Dr. Robert Koch announced his discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that causes TB. This year’s World TB Day theme “It’s TIME!” highlights CDC’s efforts to eliminate TB in the United States and around the world.
World TB Day MMWR
Globally, tuberculosis (TB) is the leading cause of death by an infectious disease – with an estimated 10 million cases of disease and 1.57 million deaths in 2017. As ambitious targets for reducing TB burden have been set, a new report highlights the need for improved TB case finding, treatment, and prevention to decrease the global burden of TB.
Globally, tuberculosis (TB) is the leading cause of death by an infectious disease – with an estimated 10 million cases of disease and 1.57 million deaths in 2017. As ambitious targets for reducing TB burden have been set, a new report highlights the need for improved TB case finding, treatment, and prevention to decrease the global burden of TB.
At the PEPFAR-supported Macia Health Centre in Mozambique’s Gaza Province, cough officer and lay counselor Carlos Manuel Langa is tasked with both case detection in the health facility and HIV testing and counselling in the TB section under the facility’s “one stop shop” model of integrated TB/HIV service delivery. He tells all of his clients in the facility waiting area that, if anyone has a cough, “It’s time to speak up and be treated!”
In the Gaza Province of Mozambique, Saujina Simango, a TB patient currently receiving treatment at the Macia Health Centre, has been identified as a TB index case and consented for the local community health worker (CHW) to visit her and screen her household for TB as well as provide counseling and testing for HIV. Thanks to all she has learned about TB from the CHW, she now spreads the message throughout her community that TB is preventable and curable.
Herminia Sibanda, a health worker in Mozambique’s Gaza Province, is tasked with TB index-case contact tracing and regularly provides TB awareness lectures at health facilities and within her community. She also refers eligible cases for TB preventive treatment to clinicians. In addition to her role at the Macia Health Center, she is also an activist for the “Total Control of the Epidemic” program, which is a comprehensive and systematic HIV/AIDS prevention and care model that combines counseling, field-testing, education, and community mobilization.
As a laboratory technician at the Macia Health Centre in Gaza Province, Mozambique, Vivia Panguana has been trained on use of the GeneXpert machine for rapid TB diagnosis. Now, thanks in part to her efforts, all patients at the health facility—as well as nine peripheral facilities—have immediate access to this technology. As a result, detection of new TB cases and linkage to care have been greatly improved.
Dr. Rohit Sarin, Director of India’s National Institute of Tuberculosis and Respiratory Disease (NITRD), has worked to increase provider capacity through its multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) ECHO clinics. The ECHO model (which stands for Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) expands capacity to manage complex diseases by sharing knowledge, disseminating best practices, and building communities of practice. Dr. Sarin and NITRD staff comprise the MDR-TB ECHO hub in India which allows experts to share the nuances of managing challenging TB cases with providers and address training gaps in management of MDR-TB patients.
SHARE INDIA (which stands for “Society for Health Allied Research and Education” INDIA) in collaboration with Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai has established an innovative airborne infection control (AIC) unit that conducts health care facility assessments for compliance with AIC practices and provides mentorship for proper and effective implementation of AIC interventions to prevent transmission of TB in health care facilities. The SHARE team has assessed AIC activities in over 110 health care facilities in Mumbai and provided support to over 1,000 health care providers on AIC measures.
SHARE India, along with India’s National Institute of Tuberculosis and Respiratory Disease, Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes), CDC, and the National AIDS Control Organization of India led virtual e-NISCHIT (which stands for electronic National Initiative to Strengthen and Coordinate HIV/TB Response) ECHO clinics to educate health care providers from antiretroviral treatment (ART) centers on HIV-TB co-management—reaching approximately 1,500 health care providers in 115 ART centers around the country in 25 interactive sessions. About 25 experts in HIV-TB from the Government of India and private institutions provided input to 21 live cases presented from the field during these sessions.
Albertina Zodwa Nyatsi, founder and director of Swaziland’s Positive Women Together in Action, is a dedicated and resilient TB/HIV advocate at both the local and international levels representing TB survivors while challenging governments to commit themselves to the fight to end TB. Her efforts have resulted in increased knowledge about TB through prevention and treatment literacy trainings and campaigns; increased identification of missing cases through Swaziland’s TB active case-finding activities; and formation of support groups for TB survivors and patients through which they can access psychosocial support and, in turn, reduce the effects of stigma and discrimination.
Grisel Rodríguez Cuns, a medical microbiologist at Centro Asistencial Médico de Soriano in Mercedes, Uruguay, works in search of the respiratory symptoms of TB—such as a cough for 15 days or more, weight loss, night sweating, appetite loss, cough with blood, sputum, or fatigue. In his efforts to reduce TB transmission, he focuses his work on the active search for TB patients, early detection of ill patients, and education of communities and health care workers.
Resources
CDC’s Division of Global HIV & TB offers these resources, which can be shared across various networks in the lead-up to World TB Day and year-round.
Multidrug Resistant TB Factsheetpdf icon
This brief overview describes CDC’s response to the global threat of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis
TB Fact Sheetpdf icon
An overview of CDC’s global TB efforts and return on investments in responding to one of the world’s greatest health threats
Social Media Cards
Shareable social media graphics that highlight the burden of TB, global progress to date, and CDC’s leadership to help end the epidemic