José Luis Castro, Executive Director of The Union, has had an opinion piece published in Project Syndicate, urging for immediate and rapid global action on child tuberculosis.
José Luis Castro, Executive Director of The Union, has had an opinion piece published in Project Syndicate, urging for immediate and rapid global action on child tuberculosis (TB). The article emphasises the need for serious commitment from political leaders gathering at the High-Level Meeting on TB in September.
Stressing the vital importance of a human-rights led approach, he said: “TB in children is both a moral and a political problem. As such, governments should put human rights at the centre of their TB strategies, policies, and public-health services.”
He drew on The Union’s experience of tackling child TB in Uganda to highlight the need for more work in this area, saying, “beyond this example, children have generally been left out of TB research, and we urgently need to develop new tools designed specifically for them.”
The Union recently produced an advocacy report on child TB - Silent Epidemic: A Call to Action Against Child Tuberculosis - exposing the issue.