29 November 2015

The Donald Woods Foundation is hosting delegates on a one-day tour of Tuberculosis programme activities in Buffalo City on 30 November 2015.

The delegates representing the Lilly/Donald Woods Foundation MDR-TB partnership in Buffalo City will visit schools in Duncan Village, the Dimbaza Community Health Centre, the newly refurbished Nkqubela Hospital in Mdantsane and the Fort Glamorgan prison where they will observe the daily battle against multi-drug resistant (MDR) TB and its treatment in the Eastern Cape.

South Africa has a high TB burden and one of the highest MDR-TB burdens on the continent. According the Health Systems Trust’s 2014/15 District Health Barometer, TB remains a problem with BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), which account for almost 50% of the global TB burden. The 2014 Global TB report estimates that South Africa still has the second-highest incidence of TB in the world (860 per 100 000).

The visit is being hosted by the Donald Woods Foundation, Lilly’s Eastern Cape partner in tackling MDR-TB and other diseases such as diabetes, hypertension and HIV both in the greater Buffalo City area and the deeply rural Mbashe district in former Transkei.

Following the visit, the Lilly delegates will be joining more than 3 000 international participants in the 46^th Union World Conference on Lung Health taking place at the Cape Town International Convention Centre from 2-6 December.

DWF’s MDR-TB programme manager, Rose Ewing, and head peer educator, Portia Ngcaba, will both be attending parts of the Conference in Cape Town. See www.worldlunghealth.org

More about DWF MDR-TB programme

The Donald Woods Foundation is partnering with Lilly and United Way Worldwide to tackle MDR-TB in the Eastern Cape.

As part of this joint initiative, DWF has been training Buffalo City ward councillors and other community leaders on all aspects of MDR/XDR-TB.

DWF is doing this by assisting the Eastern Cape Department of Health in decentralising MDR and XDR-TB treatment in the Buffalo City region to reduce TB transmission by strengthening prevention and control in local clinics, taxi ranks, schools and prisons.

The partnership has set up psychosocial support systems for MDR/XDR-TB patients by training peer educators to further provide support to patients, their families and the wider community.

This work would not be possible without the support of Lilly.