Tuberculosis is still a public health problem worldwide. According to the World Health Organization, it affects 9 million people worldwide every year. It also remains one of the most deadly diseases with 1,500,000 deaths annually.
Despite the efforts of the international community to help reduce the negative impact of this disease on the health of populations, it should be noted that the burden of this disease remains too heavy for our health systems. Our continent, Africa, has the highest proportion of new cases per capita, with more than 280 cases per 100,000 inhabitants in 2013.
In all countries of the subregion, governments have for many years already had in place national tuberculosis control programmes that are trying to develop national responses to the tuberculosis epidemic. But each country operated as if tuberculosis was supposed to respect borders. In addition, our countries share the same difficulties in the fight against this disease.
It was therefore important to create a framework for consultation between programme managers in order to be able to fight this issue together.
