World TB Day 2024
Preventing tuberculosis (TB) is the focus of our World Tuberculosis Day 2024 campaign.
We mark World Tuberculosis Day each year to raise public awareness about the devastating health, social and economic consequences of TB and to step up efforts to end the global TB epidemic.
Progress towards ending TB has been promising across the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region in recent years.
From 2020 to 2022, across the Region as a whole:
- treatment coverage increased by over 30%
- diagnosis with WHO-recommended diagnostics grew by 21%
- the number of rifampicin/multidrug-resistant TB cases diagnosed and treated rose by 39%.
Moreover, treatment success rates are higher in the Eastern Mediterranean Region than in any other WHO region: 92% for drug-susceptible TB (2021 cohort) and 73% for drug-resistant TB (2020 cohort).
But there are still challenges too, not least the limited provision of TB preventive treatment (TPT). In 2022, across the Region, only 5.3% of eligible contacts of TB patients and 8.1% of people living with HIV received TPT. While TPT is an integral part of national TB policies, only 8 countries of the Region provide TPT to children aged under 5 years, and just 3 countries give TPT to people living with HIV.
For World TB Day 2024, our focus is on improving TB prevention. We need to promote the scale-up of TPT provision across the Region. This is also part of following up on the political declaration of the United Nations General Assembly’s second high-level meeting on the fight against tuberculosis (September 2023).
Key messages
Consider prevention if exposed to a TB patient or living with HIV
- TB preventive treatment is effective if you have been exposed to TB.
- TB services are free.
- TB preventive treatment can protect people living with HIV, and children and other family members of TB patients.
- WHO-recommended shorter preventive treatments are now available.
- TB preventive treatment should be taken by people at risk of TB, even if they have no symptoms of TB.
- Anyone can contract and develop TB.
Increase the number of eligible people receiving preventive TB treatment across the Eastern Mediterranean Region to at least 2 million per year by 2030
- It’s time to translate political commitment to end TB into investment in more resources to improve access to new TB preventive treatment regimens.
- Let’s work to increase high-level commitment to invest in TB research to achieve the End TB Strategy targets.
- TB preventive treatment can reduce rates of progression from infection to active TB disease.
- Together we must intensify efforts to scale up provision of TB preventive treatment for eligible populations.
Campaign materials
Regional Director's message
Today, on World Tuberculosis Day, we commemorate the ongoing efforts to combat this infectious disease, which tragically claims over 1 million lives annually – 7% of which occur in the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region. Each year, this day serves as a reminder that ending TB is within our reach.
Prevention is indeed better than cure; therefore, preventive treatment is one of the crucial interventions against TB. This intervention, part of primary health care, aims to halt the progression from latent TB infection to active TB disease.
