Global TB Guidelines, Policies and Plans

Tuberculosis remains a significant public health concern in resource-poor communities in South Africa.  Communication has a critical role in supporting biomedical responses to the TB epidemic, especially considering assertions that ‘For perhaps the first time, the world is faced with a health threat against which the only effective barrier is not only medical, but also behavioural. 

Multidrug-resistant (MDR) tuberculosis (TB) is a growing global health crisis; MDR-TB is defined TB disease caused by strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis with in vitro resistance to at least isoniazid and rifampicin, and it is estimated there are more than five million people infected and sick with drug-resistant forms of TB in the world today. With the increasing use of the Xpert MTB/RIF® to detect both TB and rifampicin resistance, the term “rifampicin-resistant TB” (RR-TB) is increasingly used as well.

Patients on treatment for drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) face many challenges, most notably difficult side effects such as nausea, hearing loss and fatigue that may impact the patient’s quality of life, capacity to work and ability to continue activities of daily living. Recent studies have identified medication side effects as a major factor for patients stopping treatment prematurely. The 2017 WHO Global TB Report noted a continued crisis related to treatment outcomes for drug-resistant TB with only 54% of patients successfully completing treatment in 2014.

The 2018 United Nations General Assembly High-Level Meeting (HLM) on Tuberculosis and the current revision of the Roadmap for childhood tuberculosis together present an important moment to consolidate and advance advocacy, commitment, resource mobilization and joint efforts by all stakeholders to provide health care and address the burden of TB among children.

WHO has published a global TB report every year since 1997. The main aim of the report is to provide a comprehensive and up-to-date assessment of the TB epidemic, and of progress in prevention, diagnosis and treatment of the disease at global, regional and country levels. This is done in the context of recommended global TB strategies and targets endorsed by WHO’s Member States and broader development goals set by the United Nations. 

The data in this report are updated annually.

WHO has published a global TB report every year since 1997.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for 2030 were adopted by the United Nations in 2015. One of the targets is to end the global TB epidemic. The WHO End TB Strategy, approved by the World Health Assembly in 2014, calls for a 90% reduction in TB deaths and an 80% reduction in the TB incidence rate by 2030, compared with 2015.

Tuberculosis (TB) is the leading infectious disease killer globally, and in 2015 it claimed the lives of 1.8 million people. The deadly disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) is transmitted through the air from person to person and it occurs in the U.S. and around the world. TB is curable, but inappropriate treatment can lead to multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB), which is resistant to the two most effective anti-TB drugs, and extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB), which is often deadly. An MDR-TB outbreak in the U.S.

The Global Plan to End TB provides a roadmap for the fight against TB for a five-year period.

The Partnership has launched the new Global Plan to End TB 2016 - 2020. The Plan will provide a costed blue-print for how global TB efforts can become significantly more ambitious and effective over the next five years by dramatically changing the way TB programs are run. It will outline what it takes to set the world on the right track to reach the goals set in the post-2015 Global TB Strategy.