12th WHO National Tuberculosis (TB) Programme Managers’ Meeting and 16th Wolfheze Workshops
WHO
The 12th WHO National Tuberculosis (TB) Programme Managers’ Meeting and the 16th Wolfheze Workshops were held in The Hague, Netherlands, on 29–31 May 2013. This event was jointly organized by WHO/Europe, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and KNCV Tuberculosis Foundation and brought together more than 200 participants from 54 countries to share experiences and to review and discuss progress and plans for strengthening TB control in the European Region.
The aim of the Workshops was to strengthen TB control in the WHO European Region, with an emphasis on sharing experiences and discussing progress and plans for development of Region-specific guidance documents based on a consensus-building approach.
The programme focused on the progress made following the Berlin Declaration on Tuberculosis (2007), the launch of the ECDC "Framework action plan to fight tuberculosis in the European Union" and the "Consolidated Action Plan to Prevent and Combat Multidrug- and Extensively Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis in the WHO European Region 2011–2015".
Key outcomes of the meeting included:
- a general overview of progress made in controlling TB in the European Region and the introduction of new global guidelines for systematic screening of TB;
- discussions on country experiences and measures to improve laboratory networks; patient management and innovative models of care; enhanced case-finding within high risk settings; challenges in extrapulmonary TB; TB among vulnerable populations; childhood TB, and the role of civil society and next steps in those areas;
- initial establishment of 3 new Wolfheze working groups on 1) health financing; 2) social determinants; and 3) intensive case-finding/screening.
