Marina is a Romanian citizen who was studying law at the University of Manchester in the UK when she was diagnosed with multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB). Marina was studying abroad in Lyon, France in summer 2012 when she developed a cough that would not go away. Her symptoms led her down a long road of doctors and tests as various French doctors struggled to identify a disease many believe no longer exists in Europe. One doctor even diagnosed Marina with hay fever and gave her medicines to ease hay fever symptoms.

At a time of great challenges for Ukraine, twenty-three tuberculosis (TB) activists, representing twelve countries from the Eastern European and Central Asian region, gathered in Kyiv to attend a training aimed at strengthening their capacity to participate in national and regional TB responses.

The TB Europe Coalition released a call to action urging the European Union to take immediate action against drug resistant tuberculosis, which is a serious cross-border health threat.

With EU elections coming up soon, there is a great opportunity for the new European Institutions to take concrete initiatives on drug-resistant tuberculosis: the only ingredient missing so far is political will.

Chased by tuberculosis for more than twenty years, Igor (42), from the small town Anenii Noi in Moldova, lives in dark hopelessness for a recovery. His wife has passed away and his children have been taken to a specialised institution.

On World TB Day 2014, the TB Europe Coalition calls on EU institutions to recognise MDR-TB as a cross border health threat and to provide regional political leadership in the fight against MDR-TB in the European region.

Tom Maguire from the RESULTS UK campaigns team spent two weeks during December in Romania creating a short video and photo-story on drug-resistant TB. In this blog post he discusses some of the innovative measures that have been introduced in Romania’s prisons to reduce TB rates.

Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis remains a major public health concern in several countries in the region, including in the European Union.

The European Commission has today (November 21) made a call for proposals that are working towards the development of vaccine for tuberculosis. The call is for preclinical and early clinical research into a TB vaccine and is worth up to €25 million.

On 13 November, the European Respiratory Society (ERS) organised a lunch debate “Tuberculosis in Europe: Eliminating the modern threat” hosted by Members of European Parliament (MEPs) Maria da Graça Carvalho and Carl Schlyter in the European Parliament. The meeting was a good opportunity to review the situation of the TB epidemic in the region and take stock of the work of the European Institutions in the fight against the disease.