Over 200 representatives from 33 countries, partners, civil society came together for the 5th WHO End TB Strategy Summit in Hyderabad, India, 28-29 October 2019.
This annual meeting brings together the national tuberculosis programme (NTP) managers of high priority countries along with other stakeholders including civil society to review global and national progress towards ending TB. The meeting is also an important knowledge sharing platform for countries and stakeholders.
This year’s summit focused on several top issues: scaled-up use of WHO-recommended guidelines for drug-resistant TB treatment and TB preventive treatment; adaptation and implementation of the WHO Multisectoral Accountability Framework for TB, and reaching the missed people with TB.
Countries discussed progress and innovative approaches, as well as urgent actions to be taken in 2020, in interactive group and plenary sessions. Representatives of civil society and youth joined NTP leaders in the opening and closing sessions. A special session on the Find.Treat.All.#EndTB initiative of WHO, the Global Fund and Stop TB Partnership was also organized.
Dr Tereza Kasaeva, Director of the WHO Global TB Programme, closed the meeting with an action memo for the effective TB programme manager. She stressed, “NTP managers are the main drivers of the fight to end TB. The End TB summit is an important platform to facilitate discussion and experience-sharing to enable an acceleration of efforts, notably to ensure access to patient-centered care, rapid implementation of new guidelines and innovations, as well as the multisectoral accountability framework. Following two days of intense technical discussions with national programmes and partners including the WHO civil society taskforce, I look forward to seeing progress over the coming year with optimism. We can reach our goal if we unite efforts.”