11 November 2010
International Congress Centre, Berlin, Germany

Universal access to TB prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care

Over the last decade, TB control evolved from DOTS to the Stop TB Strategy and countries documented significant progress to ensure diagnosis, treatment and care for all TB patients regardless if they are living with HIV, have MDR-TB, are children or seek care from private practitioners particularly in the last five years.

The scale-up of comprehensive TB control has also brought along challenges at country level. The wish to implement all the sub-components of the Stop TB Strategy has drawn attention from country-specific needs based on the epidemiological and socio-economic context, and the health care infrastructure. Control efforts are also hampered by health system components lagging behind, such as financial barriers to health care, weak information and surveillance systems, lack of human resources and insufficient laboratory capacity.

At the Stop TB Symposium, countries and implementation working groups of the Stop TB Partnership will share experiences on the implementation of comprehensive TB control, and discussions will be held on the need to accelerate control efforts to reach the TB related Millennium Development Goals in all the regions by tailoring the strategy to specific country needs, and to also explore the way forward beyond the MDGs in 2015.

For a detailed description of the Stop TB Symposium, click here.