03 November 2022: In two weeks, the board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria will be meeting to decide how much total grant funding will be made available to countries in the next three years. But that funding looks unlikely to include additional pledges from big donors such as the United Kingdom.

A study has found a new fingerstick blood test to be a promising tool for screening tuberculosis patients. But it’s too early to say if it’s the game changer the TB community needs to detect more TB cases and prevent transmission.

MANILA — A pilot study in India found the potential use of masks in detecting the presence of tuberculosis in children. If proven in further large-scale, multisite studies, researchers are hoping this could contribute to better childhood TB diagnosis, which remains a huge challenge globally.

Experts are predicting a novel coronavirus vaccine could be available by 2021, but the timeline for the creation of a new tuberculosis vaccine remains uncertain.

MANILA — As the Indian health ministry considers banning the export of anti-tuberculosis drugs to ensure sufficient domestic supply, aid groups have expressed concern.

MANILA — Advocates working to address the tuberculosis burden in North Korea are calling on the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria to resume its grants in the country in the next two months to ensure thousands of patients don’t fall out of treatment. The call comes just a few months before the fund's sixth replenishment conference in October.

MANILA — Experts advising the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on marketed and investigational drugs for infectious diseases and disorders were divided on whether the regulatory agency should approve a new drug as part of a proposed combination therapy for highly resistant tuberculosis.

MANILA — Global health experts will be discussing a novel approach to bring better tuberculosis drugs to the market on Sunday, the eve of the 72nd World Health Assembly.

“We can’t continue to allow governments and … global health leaders to promise ending TB by 2030 … as long as they’re not even putting their best foot forward in the course of the next 12 months, or even 12 weeks.”

While international financing for TB has grown since 2002, it remains a paltry sum compared with the vast amounts of money channeled to other infectious diseases, such as HIV and AIDS.