October 2016

This week, the U.S. government agencies responsible for implementing the National Action Plan to Combat Multi-Drug Resistant TB (NAP), the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and National Institutes of Health (NIH), released a six-month progress report on the plan's implementation. Although the update reports limited progress towards the NAP's goals, it also states that year 1 milestones for all of the plan's goals have been more narrowly drawn "to reflect activities that could be achieved with currently available resources" since the plan's release. No funding for the plan's implementation has been proposed by the Obama Administration since its release in December 2015.

Concerning implementation of the NAP's global goals, the report indicates that the number of multi-drug resistant (MDR) TB patients on treatment increased by 14 percent between 2013 and 2014. It also points out that USAID supported development of the WHO's policy on the new shortened MDR-drug regimen and will be a key implementing agency in its rollout globally, an action which also provides progress towards one of the NAP's objectives to improve treatment options for drug-susceptible and drug-resistant TB.

On domestic TB, the report notes that the CDC is upgrading its surveillance capabilities for detecting MDR-TB and has also created a mini-stockpile of some TB drugs that can be used in the event of drug shortages. In the report, the CDC indicates the NAP's goal of exploring care mechanisms for persons with drug–resistant TB who do not have a medical home "remains an unmet need." Click here to view the MDR progress report.