TB-affected communities and individuals offer valuable insight, experience and ideas that can significantly benefit the fight against TB, yet their people-centered initiatives often fall outside of the formal health sector and go largely unsupported. Community responses such as human rights and gender programs and community-led social accountability are vital in making sure that millions of people affected by TB can access quality TB services whoever they are and whatever their circumstances. Without reaching them, TB will never be eliminated.

The Stop TB Partnership’s Communities, Rights and Gender (CRG) Team prioritize the strengthening of community TB interventions that overcome barriers to accessing quality TB services, increase community and civil society engagement and improve the impact of national TB programs at all levels. People-centered community, human rights and gender TB responses are vital towards eliminating the disease by 2030 – a commitment made by world leaders in the Political Declaration at the United Nations High-Level Meeting on Tuberculosis in 2018, and in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

TB CRG Assessment Country Reports

If we are to find the missing millions, we must understand and overcome the barriers that these missing people face when they endeavor to access TB services. Since 2017, Stop TB Partnership has been supporting countries to roll out assessment tools to identify TB key and vulnerable population data gaps, human rights and gender barriers to accessing TB services and subsequent solutions to address inequalities to accessing TB prevention, treatment, care and support services.

The CRG Assessment (including of assessments of legal environments, human rights, gender and key and vulnerable populations) is guided by four overarching objectives:

  1. Improve the evidence base and national capacity to respond to the needs of TB KVPs;
  2. Meaningfully engage and strengthen capacity and build relationships among civil society and communities affected by TB to participate in national TB responses;
  3. Promote human rights-based, stigma-free legal and policy environments; and
  4. Foster gender-transformative TB programming.

The CRG Assessment is a multi-stakeholder participatory process comprising four primary stages: (1) inception, adaptation of the assessment protocol, and secondary data collection; (2) training and primary data collection; (3) data analysis and validation, and report writing; and (4) dissemination and costed action planning.

Country findings from these assessments are summarized in the following reports:

Further TB CRG Assessments are underway. Together with Socios En Salud, TB CRG Assessments are being undertaken in 11 countries in the Americas: Peru, Bolivia, Colombia, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Paraguay, Panama and Honduras. Together with Center for Supporting Community Development Initiatives an Assessment is being completed in Vietnam. In Myanmar, STP is working together with Alliance Myanmar. And, in Uganda, Zimbabwe, Cote d'Ivoire and Nepal STP is working to commence the TB CRG Assessment and Action Plan processes.

An Integrated TB CRG Assessment Tool

Evidence from country experience with the individual assessments demonstrate that in order to inform integrated actions there is a need to conduct an integrated assessment. As result of this evidence, Stop TB Partnership worked on integrating the various CRG tools, streamlining the implementation process and is currently developing an integrated CRG Tools Protocol. Based on accumulated global experience, the interim protocol will be further developed into a comprehensive TB CRG Toolkit in 2020.

TB Country-Level Assessment Protocol Template (DRAFT Working Document)

Priority TB CRG Interventions For Inclusion in Global Fund Grant Cycle 7
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TB CRG Costed Action Plan Development Guidance
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