Tuberculosis (TB) is the world’s leading infectious disease killer, responsible for over 1.2 million deaths a year. New tests, medicines, and preventive therapies can turn the tide on TB, but their impact will be limited if we do not urgently address the access barriers that stand in the way of getting these lifesaving health products to the people who need them.
10 million
More than 10 million people fell ill with TB in 2023
2 million
Each year, more than 2 million people with TB go undiagnosed and untreated
40%
of children with TB are never diagnosed and nearly all those who die were never treated
390,000
390,000 people have drug-resistant TB but only 2 in 5 access treatment
Though people living with HIV, children and pregnant and lactating women are highly susceptible to TB, their care has been largely neglected. Diagnostic tests, designed primarily for adults, are often ineffective in these groups, and a lack of systematic screening for TB risk factors means many go undiagnosed and untreated.
Even when they do receive a diagnosis, gaps in treatment remain. For children, insufficient guidance on medicine dosages and the lack of easy-to-swallow formulations have complicated pediatric TB care for decades. Pregnant and lactating women and people living with HIV face similar barriers, with limited evidence on safe and effective treatment and preventive regimens. As a result, millions of those at highest risk are not accessing interventions that could prevent TB infection from progressing to disease.
The lack of a simple, effective, same-day diagnostic test for TB, available at the primary health care level, means that many people never get a diagnosis, never access treatment, and the disease continues to spread. Diagnosing drug-resistant TB is even more challenging, costly and slow. Untreated, a person with TB can spread the disease to 10-15 others in a year.
Though treatment options have radically improved in the past decade, TB treatment still takes months, requires frequent clinic visits and can cause difficult side effects. This can lead people to abandon treatment, which can cause the illness to return and can contribute to drug resistance.
Though preventive treatments can clear a TB infection before it develops into active disease, many people at highest risk still do not have access. Widespread contact tracing is needed to reach vulnerable groups, such as children or others who have been exposed to the infection, with effective preventive care.
Our goal is to identify the most needed solutions to prevent, diagnose and treat TB and help get them off the ground so they can be rolled out widely. Below are a few examples of the innovations we are supporting.
We are committed to ensuring that new TB medicines can benefit everyone, preventive treatments reach the most at-risk populations, and TB testing is quick, accurate and accessible where it is needed most.
