Global Tuberculosis at CDC

April 6, 2015

Dear Colleagues,

We are writing to inform you of a new chapter for global tuberculosis at CDC; one that continues our commitment to ending TB as a major public health issue.

Ambitious new global targets set by the World Health Organization (WHO) and endorsed at the 2014 World Health Assembly call for the end of TB as a public health threat by 2035. Reaching this goal will require a nearly 20 percent annual reduction in TB incidence globally for the next 20 years, compared to today’s annual decline of just over 1 percent. The reality is that TB anywhere is TB everywhere. This is why the challenges of addressing TB, especially in high burden countries, must be met with a coordinated and focused global response.

To increase our impact on these urgent global TB challenges, CDC has worked over the past two years to increase the coordination and collaboration across the agency on global TB activities. Changes have included the establishment of a Global TB Coordinator, identification of new opportunities for collaboration across CDC’s TB activities, and the establishment of a Global TB Steering Group.

CDC’s next strategic step is to consolidate most of CDC’s global TB activities within the Center for Global Health. This move will establish an organizational home for global TB activities where priorities for programming and support can be optimally coordinated and resources leveraged to achieve maximum impact.

This will be accomplished by establishing a new Global TB Branch within the Division of Global HIV/AIDS (DGHA), under the leadership of Dr. Shannon Hader, that will merge staff from the National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention’s (NCHHSTP’s) Division of TB Elimination’s (DTBE’s) International Research and Programs Branch (IRPB), DGHA’s HIV/TB team, and the Global TB Coordination Office into one team. In addition, some staff from DTBE’s TB Global Laboratory Activity (GLA) team will join the DGHA International Laboratory Branch. The TB Trials Consortium and the Clinical Research Branch will remain with DTBE. The Global TB Branch will develop and implement a CDC vision and mission to address TB, multidrug-resistant TB, and HIV-associated TB in high priority, high burden countries to maximize the impact of our global TB efforts. Also, DGHA’s name will be changed to the Division of Global HIV and TB (DGHT-Proposed).

The new organizational structure will enhance coordination among global experts, in-country staff, and activities, and promote collaboration across CDC and with external partners. This change also raises the visibility of CDC’s global TB work and demonstrates its priority status within the agency. Domestic TB elimination remains a top priority for CDC. Global and domestic TB experts within CDC will continue to work together to develop, evaluate, and validate innovations in TB prevention and control.

CDC values its many partners who are helping to find, cure, and prevent TB in the United States and around the world. We welcome partner input on our strategy and priorities for optimizing global efforts to eliminate TB. In the coming weeks, Dr. Hader will provide an update regarding the transition.

We value and look forward to our continuing partnership as we work to achieve our common goal of ending the TB epidemic and eliminating this terrible scourge.

Sincerely,

/Jonathan Mermin/
Jonathan H. Mermin, M.D., MPH
Director
National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
www.cdc.gov/nchhstp

/Tom Kenyon/
Tom Kenyon, MD, MPH
Director
Center for Global Health
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention