World TB Day

Stephen Twigg Excerpts

Wednesday 27th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Sir Christopher.

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) on securing this important debate, but more importantly I congratulate him on his strong and consistent leadership and on the work of the all-party parliamentary group on global tuberculosis.

I declare a relevant interest. I visited Liberia with RESULTS UK in 2017 to look at its post-Ebola healthcare system strengthening. My hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) was part of that delegation and I understand, Sir Christopher, that if he catches your eye he will say a little more about what we learned.

Goal No. 3 of the sustainable development goals is good health and wellbeing. It commits the world to bringing about an end to TB by 2030. We know that, given the current rate of progress, we will miss that target by 150 years. As the right hon. Gentleman said, the UN high-level meeting on TB political declaration includes a commitment to find and treat 40 million people with TB by 2022. If we are going to do that, we not only need to diagnose but to successfully treat 8.5 million people this year, which is 2 million more people than were officially diagnosed in 2017.

As we have heard, later this year we have the sixth replenishment of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which is a critical opportunity to mobilise efforts to build stronger and more resilient health systems. The Global Fund is an incredibly important mechanism for donors, recipient countries, civil society and the private sector to come together in response to these epidemics. Since it was founded in 2002, the Global Fund has helped to save over 27 million lives and that is in no small part due to the generous involvement of the United Kingdom.

Almost a fifth of Global Fund annual funding goes to fighting TB—as the right hon. Gentleman reminded us, that is 70% of all of the international financing that exists to fight tuberculosis. The UK played a leading role during the last replenishment cycle, but if we are going to close the gap in the finance that is required to meet the targets that have already been described, all donors—including the UK—need to step up their financial commitment to the Global Fund.

As the right hon. Gentleman said, drug resistance has complicated the fight against TB, as it has the fight against other diseases. TB is a curable disease, but it requires strict, continuous treatment with a number of antibiotics over many months. As others have said, TB is now responsible for one in three deaths worldwide from drug resistance. If we do not step up our global efforts, we risk a resurgence in the incidence of TB, which could have a catastrophic impact on public health and the global economy.

The theme of the global goals is to leave no one behind, and addressing a health emergency is central to that. I reiterate to the Minister what others have said: we have an extraordinary opportunity. UK civil society has said that we want to step up in commitment. It has called on the British Government to pledge £1.4 billion to the Global Fund’s vital work over the next three years. I hope the Minister will respond positively on the UK’s continued commitment to tackling deadly diseases.

As we have heard, accountability is central. It involves working with civil society, working with citizens in the countries that are most affected and working with the key multilaterals—the World Bank, the United Nations and the Stop TB Partnership—so that we have a comprehensive plan that brings to an end tuberculosis by the target date of 2030. I hope the Minister will demonstrate once again the strong and clear leadership that is needed, so that we rise to the challenge in the months ahead.