The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria said on Monday that strains of tuberculosis with resistance to multiple drugs could spread widely. The International health agencies also highlighted an annual need of at least US$ 1.6 billion in international funding for treatment and prevention of the disease.
The WHO said that if fully funded, by 2016 over 90% of TB patients estimated to have MDR-TB will be detected and provided treatment in seven high-MDR-TB burden countries including India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Philippines, Ukraine and South Africa.
Based on current spending patterns the biggest funding gaps are projected for MDR-TB treatment. WHO estimates that if the funding gap is filled it could enable full treatment for 17 million TB and MDR-TB patients and save 6 million lives over the next three years. Dr Margaret Chan, director-general of WHO, and Dr Mark Dybul, executive director of the Global Fund, said that the only way to carry out the urgent work of identifying all new cases of tuberculosis, while simultaneously making progress against the most serious existing cases, will be to mobilize significant funding from domestic sources and international donors.
“We are treading water at a time when we desperately need to scale up our response to MDR-TB,” said Dr Chan. “We have gained a lot of ground in TB control through international collaboration, but it can easily be lost if we do not act now.”
It is estimated that domestic funding could increase progressively especially among lower-middle income and upper-middle income countries through to 2016. With the exception of low-income countries, most countries should have the capacity to meet a large share — but not all of their TB funding requirements — through domestic sources. For low-income countries it is expected that there will be a major need for international support.