World TB Day raises awareness about the global epidemic of tuberculosis (TB) and efforts to eliminate the disease as a public health problem. One-third of the world's population is currently infected with TB. The Stop TB Partnership, a network of organisations and countries fighting TB, organises the day to highlight the scope of the disease and how to prevent and cure it. The World TB Day 2009 slogan is 'I am stopping TB' The slogan this year is a message of empowerment and all people can do their part to stop TB -

• Patients: by becoming active participants in their own cure and taking all their anti-TB drugs as prescribed.
  
• Health workers: by staying alert to the symptoms of the disease and providing prompt diagnosis and treatment.
  
• Scientists: by engaging in needed research to develop new diagnostics, new drugs and new vaccines.
  
• Teachers: by educating their students about this age-old scourge.
  
• Communities: by sharing information to help prevent the disease and get treatment to those who need it.

There are several issues about the disease that require urgent scientific investigation:

• Basic research to better understand the complex nature of the tuberculosis bacilli;
  
• Translational research to turn scientific discoveries into new and better drugs, diagnostics and vaccines; and
  
• Operational research to make tuberculosis services more accessible and their delivery more efficient.

The annual event on 24 March marks the day in 1882 when Dr Robert Koch detected the cause of tuberculosis, the TB bacillus. This was the first step towards diagnosing and curing tuberculosis. WHO is working to cut TB prevalence rates and deaths by half by 2015. This day is about celebrating the lives and stories of people affected by TB: women, men and children who have taken TB treatment; nurses; doctors; researchers; community workers -anyone who has contributed towards the global fight against TB. The Stop TB Strategy (the Global Plan to Stop TB, 2006–2015) In 2006, WHO launched the new Stop TB Strategy. The core of this strategy is DOTS (directly observed treatment, short-course), the TB control approach launched by WHO in 1995. Since its launch, more than 22 million patients have been treated under DOTS-based services. The new six-point strategy builds on this success. It also responds to access, equity and quality constraints, and adopts evidence-based innovations in engaging with private health-care providers, empowering affected people and communities and helping to strengthen health systems and promote research. The six components of the Stop TB Strategy are:

1. Pursuing high-quality DOTS expansion and enhancement. Making high-quality services widely available and accessible to all those who need them, including the poorest and most vulnerable, requires DOTS expansion to even the remotest areas. In 2004, 183 countries (including all 22 of the high-burden countries which account for 80% of the world's TB cases) were implementing DOTS in at least part of the country.
   
2. Addressing TB/HIV, MDR (multidrug-resistant)-TB and other challenges. Addressing TB/HIV, MDR-TB and other challenges requires much greater action and input than DOTS implementation and is essential to achieving the targets set for 2015.
   
3. Contributing to health system strengthening. National TB control programmes must contribute to overall strategies to advance financing, planning, management, information and supply systems and innovative service delivery scale-up.
   
4. Engaging all care providers. TB patients seek care from a wide array of public, private, corporate and voluntary health-care providers. To be able to reach all patients and ensure that they receive high-quality care, all types of health-care providers are to be engaged.
   
5. Empowering people with TB, and communities. Community TB care projects have shown how people and communities can undertake some essential TB control tasks. These networks can mobilise civil societies and also ensure political support and long-term sustainability for TB control programmes.
   
6. Enabling and promoting research. While current tools can control TB, improved practices and elimination will depend on new diagnostics, drugs and vaccines.

10 Facts about TB Two billion people–one third of the world’s total population–are infected with TB bacilli, the microbes that cause TB. One in every 10 of those people will become sick with active TB in his or her lifetime. People living with HIV are at a much greater risk. WHO aims to reach all patients through health systems and primary health care and is working with other agencies to achieve the target under the Millennium Development Goals (MDG).

• Tuberculosis (TB) is contagious and spreads through the air. If not treated, each person with active TB can infect on average 10 to 15 people a year. Two billion people, equal to one third of the world’s total population, are infected with TB bacilli, the microbes that cause TB. One in every 10 of those people will become sick with active TB in his or her lifetime. People living with HIV are at a much greater risk
  
• Four out of ten people who become ill with tuberculosis fail to get accurate diagnosis and effective treatment.
  
• A total of 1.6 million people died from TB in 2005, equal to about 4400 deaths a day. TB is a disease of poverty, affecting mostly young adults in their most productive years. The vast majority of TB deaths are in the developing world, with more than half occurring in Asia.
  
• TB is a leading killer among people living with HIV, who have weakened immune systems. About 200 000 people with HIV die from TB every year, most of them in Africa.
  
• There were 8.8 million new TB cases in 2005, of which 80% were in just 22 countries. Per capita, global TB incidence rates are now stable or falling in all six WHO regions. But the total number of cases is still rising in the African, Eastern Mediterranean and South East Asian regions.
  
• TB is a worldwide pandemic. Although the highest rates per capita are in Africa (28% of all TB cases), half of all new cases are in six Asian countries (Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan and the Philippines).
  
• Multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) is a form of TB that does not respond to the standard treatments using first-line drugs. MDR-TB is present in virtually all countries recently surveyed by WHO and its partners. About 450,000 new MDR-TB cases are estimated to occur every year. The highest occurrence rates of MDR-TB are in China and the countries of the former Soviet Union.
  
• Extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) occurs when resistance to second-line drugs develops. It is extremely difficult to treat and cases have been confirmed in South Africa and worldwide.
  
• WHO’s Stop TB Strategy aims to reach all patients and achieve the target under the Millennium Development Goals (MDG): to reduce by 2015 the prevalence of and deaths due to TB by 50% relative to 1990 and reverse the trend in incidence. The strategy emphasises the need for proper health systems and the importance of effective primary health care to address the TB epidemic.
  
• The Global Plan to Stop TB 2006-2015, launched in January 2006, aims to achieve the MDG target with an investment of US$ 56 billion. This represents a three-fold increase in investment from 2005.