Who Is Fighting Tuberculosis
World Health Organization (WHO) |
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The World Health Organization (WHO) is a special agency of the United Nations, founded in 1948, "to provide cooperation between nations to provide health for all people".
WHO has four main functions:
- To give worldwide guidance in the field of health
- To set global standards for health
- To cooperate with governments in strengthening health programmes
- To develop and transfer appropriate health technology, information and standards.
Tuberculosis has continued to thrive in developing countries of the world and has seen a resurgence in more developed countries since the 1980s. Therefore, WHO has declared tuberculosis a global emergency, and has set up a Tuberculosis Programme to help in the fight against TB.
"Today, the primary objective of the WHO Tuberculosis Programme is to see that DOTS is used more widely so that TB sickness and death are significantly reduced. A major challenge has been to reverse the decades-old neglect of TB. Surprisingly, many policy makers are still unaware that TB is a great threat. To overcome this neglect, advocacy has been a central part of the WHO Global TB Programme strategy.
Equally challenging, WHO has needed to overcome great resistance to change in the health community. With DOTS, TB control is actually more of a management and an advocacy challenge than a medical challenge. Recognizing this, WHO has initiated the retraining of the world's TB programme managers and key staff."
As a part of their TB Programme, WHO provides up-to-date international statistics on the state of TB in the world, which you can download from their website. In addition, WHO provides information and activities that can be used in education and observation of World Tuberculosis Day on their website. WHO has declared March 24 World TB Day.
Visit the World Health Organization Home Site at http://www.who.int
Visit the WHO tuberculosis programme at http://www.who.int/gtb