Dear colleagues:
We recently bid farewell to 2014 and, as I imagine many of you are, I’m looking forward to 2015 with excitement and anticipation. It’s going to be an important year for The Union, and not only because it marks our 95th anniversary.
Last December, The Union committed to implementing US$156 million in new projects, all over the world, through 2015 and beyond. The financial investment signals a substantial uptick in The Union’s activity for the next several years, bringing the organisation’s annual operating budget to approximately US$100 million. These projects (63% of which are for TB control) represent not only a significant investment in resources, but also in trust, from some of public health’s most respected funders.
While details will be shared about these projects as we roll them out, I can say, in short, that they will allow us to grow the organisation and increase our impact in tangible ways, including through new clinical research, additions to The Union’s already deep bench of technical experts, expansion of our work in key areas such as child health and education, strengthening of our measurement and evaluation capacity, and deepening our engagement with communities directly impacted by the public health challenges we’re working to solve.
We will do this by achieving superior performance in all that we do: research, education, technical assistance and advocacy. We will do it by remembering, and echoing in our work, our founders’ unswerving dedication to the highest qualities of professionalism. And we will do it by partnering on a meaningful level with the communities we serve.
The world has changed vastly since The Union’s founding in 1920, when attending a Union conference entailed several weeks of travel and effort. Indeed, the theme for this year’s World Conference on Lung Health is “A New Agenda: Lung Health Beyond 2015.” This theme reflects the changing development paradigm in this last year of the Millennium Development Goals, and it speaks to the creativity and innovation we must bring to bear on the world’s most urgent public health challenges. But in the face of rapid change, The Union has embraced four constants in these 95 years: a tradition of excellence, the spirit of cooperation, the quest for greater knowledge and the determination to improve outcomes. Today we say, “Know. Share. Act.”
The words are new, but they encapsulate a spirit that has guided us well for nearly a century. That spirit will continue to serve us as our centennial nears.
Thank you for your contribution to The Union’s achievements over the past 12 months.
Best wishes to you and your families in the new year.
José Luis Castro
Executive Director
The Union
subtitle: International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease