Forum of International Respiratory Societies calls on all countries to commit to ending TB

    The UN High-Level Meeting (HLM) on Tuberculosis will take place today at the United Nations in New York. This will be the UN General Assembly’s first-ever meeting to accelerate efforts against this disease.

    The Forum of International Respiratory Societies (FIRS) calls on all countries to commit to ending TB at this historic meeting, which includes commitments to significantly increase funding for TB detection, treatment and prevention program and accelerating research and development into new TB diagnostic, treatment and prevention tools.

    Key Messages:

    • TB is preventable and curable, yet it remains the world’s most common infectious disease killer.
    • Childhood TB remains an uncontrolled epidemic. An estimated one million children fall with TB annually but only one in three children with TB is diagnosed, much less treated.
    • Despite its prevalence, TB continues to be chronically under-funded. The WHO estimates that research and development budgets for TB currently have a funding gap of US$1.2 billion per year.
    • For TB to be eradicated, it is essential that countries commit to ambitious targets for accelerating global progress against TB, including funding for TB programs and research and development .

    Today’s UN meeting is the first-ever HLM dedicated to TB. The main outcome of the HLM is a Ministerial Political Declaration which has been negotiated by representatives of the Member States.

    “Today, we have the opportunity to end TB, the world’s leading infectious killer. Let’s hope that all country governments, seize this historic opportunity and put us on the path to ending TB, once and for all” said Dr. Schraufnagel, Executive Director of the Forum of International Respiratory Societies.

    About the Forum of International Respiratory Societies (FIRS)

    The Forum of International Respiratory Societies (FIRS) is an organisation comprised of the world's leading international respiratory societies working together to improve lung health globally: American College of Chest Physicians (CHEST), American Thoracic Society (ATS), Asian Pacific Society of Respirology (APSR), Asociación Latino Americana De Tórax (ALAT), European Respiratory Society (ERS), International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases (The Union), Pan African Thoracic Society (PATS), Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA), and the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD).

    The goal of FIRS is to unify and enhance efforts to improve lung health through the combined work of its more than 70,000 members globally.

    For more information about FIRS please contact Lisa Roscoe This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..