Dear Partners and Friends,

At the International AIDS Society meeting in Mexico City in August, as
public health experts discussed and debated the merits of technical
interventions, a group of activists marched into the plenary session.

Don't ignore TB, they said. We are living with HIV, but dying of TB.

People living with HIV and those who actively support their cause know this
truth: TB and HIV are inextricably connected. We cannot fight one
effectively without confronting the other.

World AIDS Day is a good moment to reflect on progress we have made on the
co-epidemic over the past year.

The most significant landmark was on 9 June. For the first time ever, heads
of government, public health and business leaders, heads of UN agencies and
activists came together at UN Headquarters for the HIV/TB Global
<http://www.stoptb.org/events/hivtbleaders/default.html> Leaders' Forum. A
standing room only crowd attended the forum, which was convened by the UN
Secretary-General's Special Envoy to Stop TB, Dr Jorge Sampaio, and endorsed
by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Attended by heads of state, the UN
Secretary-General and heads of agencies including UNAIDS, PEPFAR and the
Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the Forum brought
together delegations from nearly 80 countries, including ministerial
representation.

A Call for <http://www.stoptb.org/events/hivtbleaders/call_for_action.html>
Action on HIV/TB was developed and circulated for comment. In closing the
forum, Dr Sampaio urged participants to see it as a living document and
stressed the need for partnership and coordination. Partnership is needed at
every level, he said, to save millions of lives.

We hope all of our Partners and countries will continue striving to keep
this call alive between this World AIDS Day and the next; and engage fully
in the task of scaling up HIV/TB collaborative services nationwide in their
countries. People living with HIV must be screened regularly for TB. Those
who are sick with TB need effective TB treatment, and those without TB
disease should receive preventive therapy with the drug isoniazid. And
simple measures to prevent the spread of TB among HIV-infected people,
especially in health care settings, need urgently to be put in place.

Just three weeks ago, the Board of the Global Fund to fight AIDS,
Tuberculosis and Malaria, as an outcome of its Eighteenth Board Meeting,
agreed on a decision
<http://www.theglobalfund.org/documents/board/18/GF-BM18-DecisionPoints_en.p
df> point (DP12) aimed at massive scale-up of the actions needed to fully
implement the Stop TB Strategy and the Global Plan to Stop TB. The Board
considered this decision point following a call from the Stop TB Partnership
Coordinating Board that it make a bold statement on scaling up TB control.

The Decision Point, among other sturdy measures on TB, specifies that all
applicants for Global Fund grants will henceforth be required to include
robust tuberculosis interventions in their HIV/AIDS proposals and HIV/AIDS
interventions in their tuberculosis proposals. The Board has requested the
Secretariat to review the guidelines for Phase 2 requests to require that,
with respect to continued funding for tuberculosis or HIV grants, Country
Coordinating Mechanisms (CCMs) explain their plans for scale up to universal
TB-HIV collaborative services and explicitly articulate what TB-HIV
activities, funding, and indicators will be included in each proposal.

Around the world today people are marking World AIDS Day. We hope, that
alongside their red ribbons, many people will wear the red stop sign--which
now, universally, signifies a commitment to stopping TB.



Warm regards,

Marcos Espinal




Dr Marcos A Espinal - Executive Secretary

<http://www.stoptb.org/>


Stop TB Partnership Secretariat
World Health Organization
WHO/STB/TBP
20, Avenue Appia
CH-1211 Geneva 27
Switzerland

Telephone: +41 22 791 2708
Fax: +41 22 791 4886
Email: espinalm@...
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