Civil Society Perspectives on TB/HIV Policy: A Preview of Forthcoming Reports on TB Policy in Bangladesh, Brazil, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Thailand

This report, by the Open Society Public Health Watch project, looks at the preventable but growing global TB epidemic, its interaction with HIV/AIDS, and the inadequate response to the two diseases in Bangladesh, Brazil, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Thailand.

Released to coincide with the 2006 International AIDS Conference in Toronto, Civil Society Perspectives on TB/HIV Policy argues that governments around the world are failing to address the deadly interaction between tuberculosis and HIV. The study reveals a striking lack of political commitment to control TB, despite the fact that tuberculosis is the leading infectious cause of death for people living with HIV/AIDS, and that AIDS is fueling a resurgence of TB in many areas of the world.

Through a review of TB and TB/HIV policy, and extensive consultation with policymakers, activists, and patients, the report demonstrates that the interaction between TB and HIV/AIDS is particularly deadly in many sub-Saharan African countries due to widespread stigma, low levels of awareness, poorly coordinated services, and a lack of mobilization at the local, national, and international levels.

In Tanzania, for example, the number of TB cases increased by almost six-fold between 1983 and 2003, from approximately 12,000 cases to 64,500, with 60 percent of the increase in TB incidence attributable to HIV.

HIV/AIDS is also fueling the TB epidemic in Nigeria, the nation with the largest number of new TB cases in Africa, with a 6 percent annual increase in TB prevalence, and a four-fold increase in HIV rates among people living with TB between 1991 and 2001.

While Bangladesh, Brazil, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Thailand face varying rates of TB/HIV coinfection, the report points to the need for decisive governmental action to coordinate TB and HIV/AIDS policies and programs, both in countries with high coinfection rates such as Tanzania, as well as in countries at high risk for a burgeoning coepidemic such as Bangladesh.