WHO Urges More Investment to Meet 2030 TB Prevention Target

Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja

Ahead of the 2030 deadline for global action to end tuberculosis (TB), the World Health Organisation (WHO) said there was an urgent need to invest resources necessary to ramp up the fight against the disease.

According to the WHO, from $13 billion per year pledge by world leaders to finance TB prevention and treatment by 2022, funding fell to US$5.3 billion in 2020.

In his message by WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr. Matshidiso Moeti to mark the World TB Day 2022, he said funding for TB prevention, diagnosis and treatment services has continued to fall far short of estimated global needs, and the United Nations global target.

“I urge all stakeholders to advocate for increased investment, and to ensure that TB services are integrated into the primary health care response. We must all also work more closely with our communities, leveraging their expert local knowledge to tailor response efforts for maximum impact,” he said.

Moeti also appealed to donors, the private sector, civil society and academia to pay increased attention to urgently boosting investment in the fight against TB and in TB research, in order to accelerate technological breakthroughs and uptake of innovations towards ending TB by 2030.

At the UN High-Level Meeting on TB in 2018, world leaders had agreed to mobilise $13 billion per year to finance TB prevention and treatment by 2022 and promised another US$2 billion per year for TB research in the face of growing concerns around drug-resistant TB.

Moeti said this year’s, theme, “Invest to end TB. Save lives”, emphasises the urgent need to invest the resources necessary to ramp up the fight against TB, and realise the commitments to end TB made by global leaders.

According to the WHO scribe, in 2020, South Africa provided 81 per cent of domestic funding to support TB activities, while Zambia increased its domestic funding seven-fold since 2015.

He said increased funding from domestic sources and international donors were urgently needed, “ if we are to counteract a reversal of the significant gains made against TB in the past decades.” 

He added that while national strategic plans and accompanying budgets for tuberculosis had grown in ambition, mobilisation of funding has not kept pace. 

Moeti said South Africa and Zambia are best examples of high TB burden countries that have steadily increased domestic funding specifically allocated for TB. 

“At the current rate of progress, the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) target of ending the TB epidemic by 2030 will not be achievable. 

“In Africa, governments contribute only 22 per cent of the resources required to deliver adequate TB services, with 44 per cent going unfunded, seriously impeding efforts to reduce the TB burden. 

‘”To reach the target, TB incidence would have had to record an annual decline of four per cent to five per cent in 2020, increasing to 10 per cent per year by 2025, and then to an average 17 per cent annually in the following decade. 

“In fact, the world saw an increase in the number of global TB deaths for the first time in over a decade in 2021. Contributing factors included reduced access to TB diagnosis and treatment, in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“With 36 per cent of all TB deaths occurring in Africa, failure to invest in the TB response is set to take a formidable toll on African countries,” he said. 

Moeti further said increased investment would be a game-changer, “and alleviate the preventable suffering and death of millions of our people.”

“Today, I call on governments to mobilise additional domestic financial support for TB control, including contributions to the Global Fund, which last month launched its $18-billion Seventh Replenishment campaign in a bid to counter the catastrophic impact of COVID-19 on the fight against TB,” he said.

World TB Day is observed on 24 March each year to raise public awareness and understanding about one of the globe’s deadliest infectious diseases, as well as its devastating health, social and economic impacts.