Global Action March 2010

Take Action! Urge Congress to Support Funding To Fight Tuberculosis

These people are dying and in pain here. And no one seems to care.

— Dr. Pierre-Monfort, doctor fighting against TB in a Haitian health clinic after the January 2010 earthquake.

March 24 is World TB Day, a time to raise awareness of TB and build support for the tools to fight it. March is also National Women’s History Month, a time to remember and celebrate women whose accomplishments have been historically marginalized. Sadly, tuberculosis (TB) — once known as “consumption” — cut short the lives of some of the most influential women in history, including Eleanor Roosevelt, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, the Bronte sisters, Vivien Leigh, and possibly Jane Austen.

Today, TB is still claiming too many women’s lives. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), TB is the third leading cause of death among women of reproductive age (15–44) in low-income countries and worldwide. In fact, women who develop TB disease are more likely than men to die from it, due to social or physiological reasons, or a combination of the two.

TB is now ravaging women and the poor of Haiti, which suffers from the highest per capita incidence of TB in the Americas — nearly 30,000 new cases each year — and as hospitals and clinics lie in ruins, many undergoing treatment for the deadly disease no longer have access to the medications they need. These and the deaths of 1.8 million people every year from TB can be averted with a full-course of drugs that cost as little as $16–20 per person. But when TB isn’t successfully treated, it mutates into a strain that is immune to these firstline, cost-effective antibiotics and extremely deadly and expensive to treat.

This spring, Congress will be debating the fiscal year 2011 (FY2011) budget, including foreign assistance to help fight TB. Write to your representatives and senators and ask them to write and speak to the leadership of the foreign aid subcommittee to include $650 million for TB and $1.75 billion for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria in the FY11 budget to combat this curable killer.

Take Action! Write a Letter to Your Senators and Representatives

1. Introduce yourself as a RESULTS volunteer and a constituent. Acknowledge any actions that your member has already taken to support our work or other actions on poverty and thank him/her.

2. Urge your representative/senator to write to and speak with the chair and ranking member of the Foreign Operations Subcommittee in support of key anti-poverty priorities in the FY11 foreign aid funding bill. Many members of Congress submit requests to the Appropriations Committees, so ask that these programs be included among their priorities.

House: Chair Nita Lowey (D-NY); ranking member Kay Granger (R-TX)

Senate: Chair Patrick Leahy (D-VT); ranking member Judd Gregg (R-NH)

3. Sample Letter:

Dear Senator/Representative____________:

I am a member of RESULTS and a constituent. Thank you for your support for _________.

Next, include some facts about TB, women, and/or Haiti in the opening of your letter

But you can help fight TB: members of the Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee will soon be considering spending levels for the FY2011 foreign aid spending bill. I am writing to request that you speak and write to the leadership of this subcommittee and ask that they support funding to fight TB in their bill. Please ask them to include $1.75 billion for the multilateral Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria and $650 million for bilateral efforts to control tuberculosis.

4. Request a reply and include all of your contact information. If you don’t know the aide that handles foreign aid, call the office and ask. Please e-mail and fax your letter if possible. Call and make sure the aide that handles these issues received your letter. For contact information, go to the RESULTS website: http://capwiz.com/results/dbq/officials/.

Drug-Resistant TB

Today, there are an estimated 500,000 cases of multidrug-resistant (MDR) TB every year. The disease has mutated further into strains resistant to both first- and second-line drugs — extensively drug-resistant (XDR) TB. Public health officials describe a latest strain of drug-resistant TB as almost incurable — extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis, or XXDR-TB. News reports recently told the story of a student in Florida who became the first known case of XXDR-TB inside the United States. Though he survived, it took 19 months of isolated treatment at a cost of $500,000 to cure him.

U.S. Global Leadership to Fight TB

In 2008 Congress passed the bipartisan Lantos-Hyde U.S. Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, TB, Malaria Act, which called for a bold new plan to fight TB and other diseases. So far, the Obama Administration has failed to deliver. Despite 500,000 new cases of MDR-TB every year, the administration’s proposed Global Health Initiative calls for the treatment of fewer than 10,000 cases annually. Funding for TB programs — including the highly effective Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria — has been flat-lined in the President’s budget proposal. It’s now up to Congress to correct this shortsighted move and fully fund the fight against global TB.

How Congress Funds Foreign Aid

The foreign aid funding bill, known as the Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, is the most important annual opportunity to increase resources for improving the health and livelihood of the poor. This legislation provides funding for lifesaving, community-stabilizing international health programs, basic education, microfinance, and other development assistance. Each and every member of Congress can have an important voice in shaping this bill by writing to and speaking with committee leadership before they begin drafting the spending legislation. If our members of Congress express support for our critical priorities, it will help build momentum and allow the committee leaders to be bolder.

Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria

FY11 Request: $1.75 billion for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. The multilateral Global Fund is one the most effective tools to fight AIDS, TB and malaria. Since its creation in 2001, the Global Fund has provided over 2.5 million people with treatment for AIDS, 6 million people treatment for tuberculosis, and helped distribute 104 million mosquito bed nets to prevent malaria. It has save an estimated 4 million lives. The U.S. contribution to the Global Fund is particularly critical this year because it will influence the amount that other donor commit. In November 2010 international donors will meet for a replenishment conference and make multi-year funding commitments. If the U.S. — the Global Fund’s biggest contributor — does not substantially increase its contribution, there will be little pressure on other countries to give more.

Tuberculosis

FY11 Request: Provide $650 million for scaling up critical U.S. supported efforts to control TB. In 2008, the passage of the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde U.S. Leadership Act Against AIDS, TB and Malaria authorized $4 billion in bilateral (country-to-country) TB funding over five years. To reach this authorized level, Congress must begin to scale up TB funding as envisioned in this historic legislation. TB — the world’s deadliest curable infectious disease among adults — kills 1.8 million people each year. People living with HIV/AIDS are particularly susceptible to TB infection. The rise of drug-resistant strains of TB is a result of a lack of investment in effective TB control programs, and is a threat to U.S. public health.

For assistance in completing your appropriations requests, contact John Fawcett (jfawcett@results.org) or Jennifer Maurer (jmaurer@results.org).

WHO. Fact sheet no. 334: Women’s health. World Health Organization; 2009. Available at http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs334/en/. (Accessed December 2009).

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091227/ap_on_he_me/as_med_when_drugs_stop_working_killer_tb