Write Your Members of the European Parliament
"TB is one of the most unfair fouls in the game of life. The disease most often strikes people in their prime working years, imposing a heavy cost on families' incomes. TB is curable, but TB kills. This is unacceptable. That is why I have made a commitment to the global fight against TB. Please join my team – pick up the ball and run with me to stop TB." - Luís Figo, Portuguese footballer and Stop TB ambassador, March 2008
The high incidence of TB in many countries in the European region, the high level of multidrug-resistant TB, the appearance of extensively drug-resistant TB, the TB outbreaks in the growing pool of people living with HIV, and the increasing mobility of people, all make tuberculosis a regional emergency in Europe that calls for effective region-wide control.
Write to your Members of the European Parliament to highlight the growing problem, stressing the urgent need for immediate action to tackle this crisis. Find your MEP's contact information here.
In Your Letters
Background Information
Sample Letter
IN YOUR LETTERS
- Raise your concern that TB has re-emerged as a pandemic in Europe, particularly due to recent increases in multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) and extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) in Eastern Europe.
- Point out that this hits those living in poverty hardest, but also poses a threat to health security across the European Union.
- Acknowledge that European health ministers have backed the Global Plan to Stop TB and that there is a new action plan for tackling TB within the EU.
- Ask them to do all they can to increase support and resources for fighting this regional health emergency, in order to meet the goal of halving TB prevalence and deaths in the region by 2015, compared with 1990 levels.
- Request a response.
- Send a copy of your letter to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) and let us know if you get a response!
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Introduction to TB in Europe
Every hour, 49 Europeans are diagnosed with and 7 die from tuberculosis (TB). Far from being in decline, TB remains stubbornly entrenched in many parts of Europe, with worrying developments such as the emergence of drug-resistant strains and co-infection with HIV/AIDS. Such developments threaten to undermine the significant progress made to date in the fight against the disease and pose a very real and growing threat to the whole continent.
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s many countries in the European region were left with weak health systems and poor diagnostic facilities. As a consequence, Eastern Europe has the lowest success rate for TB treatment in the world, alongside Africa. According to a report published by the World Health Organization to mark World TB Day (24 March 2008), although most of the countries in the region have managed to reduce TB incidence, drug-resistant forms of TB – including multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) and extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) have soared over the past decade.
MDR-TB and XDR-TB
MDR-TB is a form of TB that does not respond to standard treatment using first-line drugs. It takes significantly longer to treat and is many times more expensive. Second-line drugs also produce more side-effects than standard anti-TB drugs.
If treatment of MDR-TB is neglected, misused or mismanaged, even more deadly strains of TB can develop. Extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) is resistant to both first and second line drugs, leaving very few treatment options available. Doctors recently diagnosed the first UK case of XDR-TB in Glasgow.
Drug resistance is an entirely man-made phenomenon and is caused by inconsistent or incorrect monitoring and treatment of TB. Such forms of TB are more complex and expensive to treat, and represent a critical challenge for the European region. Although TB strains are changing and becoming more and more lethal, no new diagnostic methods and tools, drugs or vaccines have been developed over the past few decades.
The Scale of the Problem
Of the 53 countries in the European region, 18 have a high TB burden and in 2006, there were 433,261 new cases of TB and 62,197 TB-related deaths in the region. Drug resistance poses a particularly serious and growing threat to the region with TB patients in parts of Eastern Europe up to 10 times more likely to have MDR-TB than in the rest of the world. As WHO noted, “the hottest zones of drug-resistant tuberculosis are all around the periphery of the European Union”. This high prevalence of MDR-TB coincides with the fact that Eastern Europe has one of the fastest growing HIV infection rates in the world. TB is now the most prevalent cause of illness and death in people living with HIV/AIDS in the region, and few countries address TB/HIV co-infection in a comprehensive way. Recently the United Nations Development Programme reported more than 1.5 million people living with the virus in the region, compared to just 30,000 in 1995. TB rates also continue to soar among groups at high risk, such as migrant populations, homeless people, prisoners and other socially vulnerable groups in countries across the region.
Cause for Concern
TB is a very real and growing threat, not just to Eastern Europe but to the whole continent. The eastward expansion of the EU to include former communist bloc countries with high TB prevalence means that TB in one country is a problem for all. In this context, Dr Risards Zaleskis, WHO Regional Adviser for Tuberculosis Control, warns of a spread of multi-resistant strains: “In eastern Europe, multi-resistant strains spread continuously. If we do not address this problem locally, it is very likely that Western Europe could also be more heavily affected in the future.”
Mass migration poses a unique set of challenges in the fight against TB and is often singled out as one of the greatest cause for concern but as Dr Mario Raviglione, Director of WHO’s Stop TB Department points out; “Passport control will not halt drug resistance; investment in global TB prevention will.”
What Can the EU Do
The European Union is in a strong position to take a lead on tackling this European TB pandemic – a crisis which crosses national boundaries and requires a coordinated international response. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), an EU agency, recently launched a Framework Action Plan on fighting tuberculosis within the European Union. It notes that: “The EU countries and the European Commission have many mechanisms and opportunities that can be used to further support and enhance the high-burden countries’ own efforts, and the efforts of existing partners and agencies, to control and eliminate TB.” We believe the report’s recommendations must be implemented with urgency and determination. Increasing funding for TB control – from both the EU and its member states – is also key to tackling this pandemic. The WHO report Global Tuberculosis Control 2008, released in March 2008, reveals that despite some increases in resources, especially from the Global Fund and some middle-income countries, TB budgets are projected to remain flat in 2008 in almost all of the countries most heavily burdened by the disease. More investment is vital if a wider crisis is to be averted.
Summary
The rapid spread and high rates of MDR-TB coupled with a growing TB-HIV co-infection are serious areas of concern that threaten to unravel much of the progress made to date in the fight against TB in Europe. The EU and its member states must ensure that plans to tackle the crisis are given the political and financial support that they need, so that TB can be truly consigned to the pages of European history once and for all.
SAMPLE LETTER
But please write your own! It is much more powerful that way.
Dear Member of the European Parliament:
Every hour, 49 Europeans are diagnosed with and 7 die from tuberculosis (TB). Far from being in decline, TB remains stubbornly entrenched in many parts of Europe, with worrying developments such as the emergence of drug-resistant strains and co-infection with HIV/AIDS. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, many countries in the European region were left with weak health systems and poor diagnostic facilities. As a consequence, Eastern Europe has the lowest success rate for TB treatment in the world, alongside Africa.
Tuberculosis is most prevalent in Eastern Europe and among people in poverty throughout Europe, but especially with the rise of drug-resistant forms of the disease that are increasingly difficult and expensive to treat, TB poses a very real and dangerous threat to the whole continent. TB is a disease that crosses borders and spreads throughout a population quickly and easily. Coughing, laughing, singing, these are all ways that TB is spread.
European health ministers have backed the Global Plan to Stop TB, but more commitment and political will is needed to increase support and resources for fighting this regional health emergency and to meet the goal of halving TB prevalence and deaths in Europe by 2015. I hope you are willing to take a strong stand against tuberculosis, a completely curable disease that has haunted humanity for too long. I would appreciate a response in which you let me know what you are doing to stop this horrible disease and health emergency.
Sincerely,
Your Name
