Tackling the tuberculosis epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa--unique opportunities arising from the second European Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP) programme 2015-2024

Tuberculosis (TB) today remains a global emergency affecting 9.0 million people globally. The African Region bears the highest global TB/HIV burden and over 50% of TB cases in SSA are co-infected with HIV. An estimated 1.5 million died from the TB globally in 2013. A large majority of the 360,000 HIV-positive TB cases who died were from sub-Saharan Africa. Research and development is an important pillar of the WHO post-2015 global TB strategy. Advances in development of diagnostics, drugs, host-directed therapies, and vaccines will require evaluation under field conditions through multi-centre clinical trials at different geographical locations. Thus it is critically important that these evaluations are fully supported by all African governments and the capacity, trained staff and infrastructure required to perform the research and evaluations is built and made available. This viewpoint article reviews the opportunities provided by recently launched second programme (2015-2024) of the European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP2) for tackling the TB epidemic in Africa through its magnanimous portfolio. The unique opportunities provided by EDCTP2 for leadership of scientific research in TB and other diseases fully devolving to Africa are also covered.