The Global Plan to Stop TB 2011-2015: Transforming the Fight-Towards Elimination of Tuberculosis. This new action plan, for the first time, identifies all the research gaps that need to be filled to bring rapid TB tests, faster treatment regimens and a fully effective vaccine to market. It also shows public health programmes how to drive universal access to TB care, including how to modernize diagnostic laboratories and adopt revolutionary TB tests that have recently become available.
This new roadmap for 2011-2015 follows on the Global Plan to Stop TB 2006-2015 while setting new and more ambitious targets for the next five years. It sets out to provide diagnosis and treatment approaches recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) for 32 million people over the next five years. In addition to helping public health programmes adopt already existing modern diagnostic tests, the Global Plan sets a research agenda aimed at engendering two new "while-you-wait" rapid tests that trained staff at even the most basic health outposts can use to diagnose TB accurately. By 2015, the aim is for three new drug regimens - one for drug-sensitive TB and two for drug-resistant TB - to be going through Phase III clinical trials, the final step before drugs are released to market. Four vaccine candidates should be at the same stage of testing.
The Global Plan provides a clear roadmap for addressing drug-resistant TB. It calls for 7 million people to be tested for multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) and one million confirmed cases treated according to international standards over the next five years.
Half a million people die each year from HIV-associated TB. Provided the plan's targets are met, by the end of 2015, all TB patients will be tested for HIV and, if the test is positive, receive anti-retroviral drugs and other appropriate HIV care. In HIV treatment settings, all patients will be screened for TB and receive appropriate preventive therapy or treatment as needed.
On financing, the Global Plan calls for US$ 37 billion for implementation of TB care between 2011 and 2015. A funding gap of about US$ 14 billion - approximately $US 2.8 billion per year - will remain and needs to be filled by international donors.
The plan includes a separate calculation of the funding required to meet targets for research and development: a total of US$ 10 billion, or $US 2 billion per year. High-income countries and those with growing economies will need to increase their investment in research and development to fill an estimated gap of about US$ 7 billion, or $1.4 billion per year.
The world could be on its way towards eliminating TB if all stakeholders fully invest in the Global Plan. We sincerely hope all our partners will embrace the plan, spread the word about it and do their part to achieve its objectives, goals and targets.
http://www.stoptb.org/assets/documents/global/plan/TB_GlobalPlanToStopTB2011-2015.pdf
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