The WHO End TB Strategy calls for systematic screening to ensure early diagnosis of tuberculosis (TB). Accurate, accessible and affordable screening tools are essential for systematic TB screening to be brought to the scale needed to help reduce TB incidence and mortality.
To support the implementation and scale-up of systematic TB screening, WHO is preparing for a Guideline Development Group (GDG) meeting in late 2026 to evaluate the performance of new and existing screening tools and update WHO guidance on TB screening.
In preparation for this, WHO is issuing a public call for data, appealing to national TB programmes, implementers, researchers, and other stakeholders to provide evidence that could inform the guideline process. This call has separate requests for:
- Data for new and established tools for screening for TB
The current WHO consolidated guidelines on TB screening, released in 2021, recommend specific tools for systematic screening, including symptom screening, chest X-ray (CXR) with and without computer-aided detection (CAD), C-reactive protein (CRP) for screening people living with HIV (PLHIV), and rapid molecular diagnostic tests (specifically low-complexity automated nucleic-acid amplification tests (LC-aNAATs)).In recent years, the technological landscape for molecular TB detection has expanded to include moderate-complexity nucleic-acid amplification tests (MC-aNAATs) for high volume, centralized laboratory-based detection of TB, rifampicin resistance, and isoniazid resistance, as well as near point-of-care (NPOC) tests designed for decentralized use outside of the laboratory. Alongside these, collection of tongue swabs as an alternate sample type for NPOC or LC-aNAAT tests offer a potential solution to sputum scarcity (inability to produce adequate sputum samples), facilitating molecular screening in populations unable to produce respiratory samples.
In addition, rapid advancements in artificial intelligence-based technology in recent years have given rise to new digital tools for detection of TB disease, including AI-based cough analyzers, digital stethoscopes, and point-of-care ultrasound with computer-aided interpretation. These technologies have the potential to improve screening for TB through the development of inexpensive, easy-to-use tests that can be rapidly applied to large populations undergoing screening.
- Data for pediatric computer-aided detection (CAD) software products for TB
The advent of computer-aided detection (CAD) products for automated interpretation of digital chest radiography for TB screening represented a major technological advancement for scaling up TB screening in recent years. However, when CAD products were first recommended by WHO in 2021, there were not yet products available with proven performance in pediatric and adolescent populations (under 15 years of age). Since 2021, many CAD products have become available for TB evaluation in pediatric populations, and WHO is preparing to evaluate these products for potential expansion of CAD recommendations to all age groups.
More details for each specific data request, including the complete PICO questions and types of data sought, can be found here.
Data should be received by 30 May 2026. Researchers who have data to contribute to this call for data are requested to contact WHO (Cecily Miller at cmiller@who.int and Dennis Falzon at falzond@who.int) by 31 March 2026 to indicate their interest in submitting data to this process. If researchers are interested in contributing data that will become available after 30 May 2026, please contact us as soon as possible and let us know further details about what data are expected and when they will become available.