Global tuberculosis control and patient care

A ministerial meeting of high M/XDR-TB burden countries
Beijing, China, 1-3 April 2009

Ministers from high M/XDR-TB burden countries¹ met in Beijing, China, during 1-3 April 2009, to urgently address the alarming threat of MDR-TB. Organized by the World Health Organization, together with the Ministry of Health of the People's Republic of China and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, this ministerial meeting, aimed:

• to build consensus and political commitment globally and in high M/XDR-TB burden countries; and
• to act immediately to scale up the prevention and management of MDR-TB and start developing 5-year national strategic plans for MDR-TB, embedded within national TB and health sector plans.

This was reflected in a Call for Action on M/XDR-TB to help strengthen health agendas and ensure that urgent and necessary commitments for actions and funding are made to prevent this impending epidemic. A preceding call for action by community representatives coming out of the Stop TB Partners Forum in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in March 2009, was also presented in Beijing.

More information

:: M/XDR-TB presentations

:: Key bottlenecks in M/XDR-TB control and patient care

:: M/XDR-TB country profiles

:: M/XDR-TB: challenges, management and surveillance

¹ High M/XDR-TB Burden Countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Belarus, Bulgaria, China, Democratic Republic of Congo, Estonia, Ethiopia, Georgia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Republic of Moldova, Myanmar, Nigeria, Philippines, Russian Federation, Pakistan, South Africa, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Viet Nam.

MDR-TB (multidrug-resistant tuberculosis) and XDR-TB (extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis) are defined throughout this site as M/XDR-TB.