Evaluating novel diagnostics and enabling preventive measures for childhood tuberculosis between the UK and partners in Sub-Saharan Africa
Lead Research Organisation:
MRC Unit the Gambia
Abstract
This project aims to develop and validate better diagnostic tools for children with TB (Find and Treat), as well as looking at implementation of preventive therapy for those already infected but not yet ill, but who might progress to disease if not receiving the recommended intervention- (Screen and Prevent).
Importance of TB in LMIC:
Around 1 million children fall ill from TB each year and 140 000 die. Many countries struggle to deliver the age-stratified notifications for TB in children to the WHO, and there is reluctance to engage in diagnosing and treating TB in children in many settings, as staff feel ill equipped to confirm a "gold standard" diagnosis, based on microbiological evidence. This situation is pertinent in Africa and continues to lead to unnecessary morbidity and mortality and a reservoir of cases for the future. The roadmap for the elimination of TB sets priorities for achieving global TB control and within this effort, childhood TB has been identified as a neglected problem, but of great importance for overall TB control (WHO Global Plan for TB).
This requires two interventions: 1. to appropriately diagnose the cases and place on treatment -find and treat- and 2. to prevent secondary cases in TB-exposed children, which can be done successfully by delivering preventive medication- screen and prevent.
Why is it more difficult to diagnose TB in children?
Due to the limited number of mycobacteria contained in their sputa, conventional microbiological diagnostics perform poorly in children. Unless more sensitive diagnostics for paucibacillary disease can be developed, it is unlikely that the current situation of two thirds of children receiving treatment for TB without a confirmed diagnosis will change. Host-derived biosignatures in blood or urine therefore hold promise for development into point-of care tests for childhood TB.
What do we want to do?
We have considerable experience in the management of childhood TB in both the UK and The Gambia, and this project aims to involve new partners in Africa to find and treat children with TB using existing and new diagnostics. We have already developed such new tests but they need to be further validate also in children who have HIV or malnutrition. We will therefor recruit a large prospective court of children likely o have TB to validate the new diagnostics.
In addition, we want to work the National TB programs (NTP) in the partner countries to implement a preventive strategy, as supported by the WHO but not implemented on the ground. We want to understand the bottlenecks within the care path and train members of the NTP to recognise TB in children and take the necessary preventive steps to avoid secondary cases in families. Based on the UK model, we have already established a screen-and-prevent- program of contact screening for children exposed to TB in their households in The Gambia, which has the support of the NTP. Our find and treat and screen and prevent activities have increased the case notifications by 50% over the last 3 years. This approach now requires full integration into the NTP programs in other countries and systematic evaluation to determine its long term impact on national TB figures also in our partner countries. It could serve as an important model for the WHO strategy o improve prevention of TB worldwide but each country might have specific requirements and our project will deliver data from 4 different African settings to inform the recommendations.
We expect that our work can improve TB control and that we can create a network of excellence with specialist knowledge for childhood TB in Africa, as we have already done in Europe.
Importance of TB in LMIC:
Around 1 million children fall ill from TB each year and 140 000 die. Many countries struggle to deliver the age-stratified notifications for TB in children to the WHO, and there is reluctance to engage in diagnosing and treating TB in children in many settings, as staff feel ill equipped to confirm a "gold standard" diagnosis, based on microbiological evidence. This situation is pertinent in Africa and continues to lead to unnecessary morbidity and mortality and a reservoir of cases for the future. The roadmap for the elimination of TB sets priorities for achieving global TB control and within this effort, childhood TB has been identified as a neglected problem, but of great importance for overall TB control (WHO Global Plan for TB).
This requires two interventions: 1. to appropriately diagnose the cases and place on treatment -find and treat- and 2. to prevent secondary cases in TB-exposed children, which can be done successfully by delivering preventive medication- screen and prevent.
Why is it more difficult to diagnose TB in children?
Due to the limited number of mycobacteria contained in their sputa, conventional microbiological diagnostics perform poorly in children. Unless more sensitive diagnostics for paucibacillary disease can be developed, it is unlikely that the current situation of two thirds of children receiving treatment for TB without a confirmed diagnosis will change. Host-derived biosignatures in blood or urine therefore hold promise for development into point-of care tests for childhood TB.
What do we want to do?
We have considerable experience in the management of childhood TB in both the UK and The Gambia, and this project aims to involve new partners in Africa to find and treat children with TB using existing and new diagnostics. We have already developed such new tests but they need to be further validate also in children who have HIV or malnutrition. We will therefor recruit a large prospective court of children likely o have TB to validate the new diagnostics.
In addition, we want to work the National TB programs (NTP) in the partner countries to implement a preventive strategy, as supported by the WHO but not implemented on the ground. We want to understand the bottlenecks within the care path and train members of the NTP to recognise TB in children and take the necessary preventive steps to avoid secondary cases in families. Based on the UK model, we have already established a screen-and-prevent- program of contact screening for children exposed to TB in their households in The Gambia, which has the support of the NTP. Our find and treat and screen and prevent activities have increased the case notifications by 50% over the last 3 years. This approach now requires full integration into the NTP programs in other countries and systematic evaluation to determine its long term impact on national TB figures also in our partner countries. It could serve as an important model for the WHO strategy o improve prevention of TB worldwide but each country might have specific requirements and our project will deliver data from 4 different African settings to inform the recommendations.
We expect that our work can improve TB control and that we can create a network of excellence with specialist knowledge for childhood TB in Africa, as we have already done in Europe.
Technical Summary
Tuberculosis causes significant morbidity and mortality in children worldwide. Bacteriological confirmation of TB in children is rare and lack of suitable alternative diagnostics is a major bottleneck to progress in identifying patients in need of treatment and for enrolment into clinical trials of new vaccines and therapies. As shown by our ongoing work, suitable cohorts of children with TB disease, infected and controls can be reliably recruited and their specimens analysed, and our expertise can now be extended to the new sites in Africa. Supported by the state-of-the art technologies, bioinformatics and public health expertise available to the PI in the UK, our team of local and international investigators will further develop and evaluate existing and new tools based on both host immune response and microbiology to build similar expertise in other LMIC where childhood TB remains a major problem.
Building on our previous MRC-supported work, we will test samples from children suspected to have TB by using a combined approach of cellular and molecular methods to validate protein and transcriptome -based diagnostic biosignatures. In this period of available funding, we will also set up pilot sites to administer preventive treatment to childhood contacts and translate our knowledge from the UK and the MRCG to the new partners in Africa. Translation into Policy: Integration of measurable host responses into diagnostic algorithms for patient care will not only secure the diagnosis of the individual patient but also facilitate clinical trials of new vaccines and drugs at participating sites. This project will build capacity for such future studies by creating a network of excellence for childhood TB. Epidemiological datasets that link TB exposure, infection and disease can serve as a model for public health and TB control and enable the wider roll out of IPT in the countries via the national TB programs with whom this proposal is engaging, as recommended by the WHO.
Building on our previous MRC-supported work, we will test samples from children suspected to have TB by using a combined approach of cellular and molecular methods to validate protein and transcriptome -based diagnostic biosignatures. In this period of available funding, we will also set up pilot sites to administer preventive treatment to childhood contacts and translate our knowledge from the UK and the MRCG to the new partners in Africa. Translation into Policy: Integration of measurable host responses into diagnostic algorithms for patient care will not only secure the diagnosis of the individual patient but also facilitate clinical trials of new vaccines and drugs at participating sites. This project will build capacity for such future studies by creating a network of excellence for childhood TB. Epidemiological datasets that link TB exposure, infection and disease can serve as a model for public health and TB control and enable the wider roll out of IPT in the countries via the national TB programs with whom this proposal is engaging, as recommended by the WHO.
Planned Impact
The problem:
Tuberculosis remains a key global health issue affecting LMIC and continues to kill adults and children in large numbers worldwide.
Our project proposal has been developed to address a critical bottleneck for patient management, which particularly affects ODA-supported countries: a) the problem of accurate diagnostics for tuberculosis (TB) in children and b) the availability of preventive therapy to those most at risk.
These bottlenecks are widely acknowledged by the scientific community and international TB program officers, and remain at the center of international research efforts, as highlighted in the special supplement to the Journal of Infectious Disease, published on World TB Day 2012 and the recent WHO Global TB control plan.
The Partners:
Our multi-disciplinary research program brings together investigators from 4 sub-saharan African countries burdened by childhood tuberculosis with
a) cutting-edge technologies to derive novel child-specific TB diagnostics available at Imperial College, London and
b) the invaluable support from the national TB control programs to assess barriers to implementation of an intervention already identified as life-saving.
This knowledge will ultimately facilitate programmatic improvements as well as clinical trials for new treatments and vaccines, where accurate diagnostics are of the foremost importance. Without a better diagnostic approach, which doesn't exclusively rely on bacteriological confirmation, children are not only likely to miss out on appropriate treatment but are likely to be excluded from any studies of improved treatment for TB or ongoing vaccine trials.
The approach:
We will leverage pilot data already collected from UK and Africa-based funded-and patented-research into novel diagnostics by establishing validatory cohorts in additional settings, improve the knowledge base about childhood TB and set up delivery of preventive therapy at sentinel sites with the support of the respective NLTP to make this a sustainable intervention for TB control in the future.
We expect that the validation of recently identified biosignatures in childhood populations will confirm preliminary results and stimulate the development of more user-friendly versions of assays, including translation into nanotechnological and lateral flow-based assays.
Future opportunities resulting from the work:
a) novel diagnostics: The identification of new diagnostic biomarkers and host/pathogen signatures will drive the development of point-of care tests for TB by identifying new leads in either metabolomics, cytokine or gene signatures, which are amenable to further development. We already hold links to industry partners and not-for profit organisations such as FIND/PATH. Following validation, these can be further exploited and included in future applications, e.g. to the MRC's collaborative grant schemes with industry and technology translation.
b) Our second objective is to develop sustainable partnerships and policy links with the National Leprosy and TB Programs (NLTP) in the partner countries by sharing our experience with the roll-out of preventive therapy (IPT) in the UK and The Gambia. We anticipate that pilot sites will identify unique and possibly country-specific challenges and opportunities for IPT implementation. We will liaise with experts in cost-effectiveness analysis (i.e. Imperial College Business school, PHE, WHO) to quantify the potential need for resources, depending on the implementation pathway chosen. We aim to attract further funding from health systems research funds. Systematic monitoring and evaluation led by expertise from both north and south collaborators within an academic framework will allow the TB program decision makers to develop more appropriate predictions of impact. Through close links between our research and the NLTP, their experience can then be shared with the StopTB partnerships and WHO.
Tuberculosis remains a key global health issue affecting LMIC and continues to kill adults and children in large numbers worldwide.
Our project proposal has been developed to address a critical bottleneck for patient management, which particularly affects ODA-supported countries: a) the problem of accurate diagnostics for tuberculosis (TB) in children and b) the availability of preventive therapy to those most at risk.
These bottlenecks are widely acknowledged by the scientific community and international TB program officers, and remain at the center of international research efforts, as highlighted in the special supplement to the Journal of Infectious Disease, published on World TB Day 2012 and the recent WHO Global TB control plan.
The Partners:
Our multi-disciplinary research program brings together investigators from 4 sub-saharan African countries burdened by childhood tuberculosis with
a) cutting-edge technologies to derive novel child-specific TB diagnostics available at Imperial College, London and
b) the invaluable support from the national TB control programs to assess barriers to implementation of an intervention already identified as life-saving.
This knowledge will ultimately facilitate programmatic improvements as well as clinical trials for new treatments and vaccines, where accurate diagnostics are of the foremost importance. Without a better diagnostic approach, which doesn't exclusively rely on bacteriological confirmation, children are not only likely to miss out on appropriate treatment but are likely to be excluded from any studies of improved treatment for TB or ongoing vaccine trials.
The approach:
We will leverage pilot data already collected from UK and Africa-based funded-and patented-research into novel diagnostics by establishing validatory cohorts in additional settings, improve the knowledge base about childhood TB and set up delivery of preventive therapy at sentinel sites with the support of the respective NLTP to make this a sustainable intervention for TB control in the future.
We expect that the validation of recently identified biosignatures in childhood populations will confirm preliminary results and stimulate the development of more user-friendly versions of assays, including translation into nanotechnological and lateral flow-based assays.
Future opportunities resulting from the work:
a) novel diagnostics: The identification of new diagnostic biomarkers and host/pathogen signatures will drive the development of point-of care tests for TB by identifying new leads in either metabolomics, cytokine or gene signatures, which are amenable to further development. We already hold links to industry partners and not-for profit organisations such as FIND/PATH. Following validation, these can be further exploited and included in future applications, e.g. to the MRC's collaborative grant schemes with industry and technology translation.
b) Our second objective is to develop sustainable partnerships and policy links with the National Leprosy and TB Programs (NLTP) in the partner countries by sharing our experience with the roll-out of preventive therapy (IPT) in the UK and The Gambia. We anticipate that pilot sites will identify unique and possibly country-specific challenges and opportunities for IPT implementation. We will liaise with experts in cost-effectiveness analysis (i.e. Imperial College Business school, PHE, WHO) to quantify the potential need for resources, depending on the implementation pathway chosen. We aim to attract further funding from health systems research funds. Systematic monitoring and evaluation led by expertise from both north and south collaborators within an academic framework will allow the TB program decision makers to develop more appropriate predictions of impact. Through close links between our research and the NLTP, their experience can then be shared with the StopTB partnerships and WHO.
Organisations
- MRC Unit the Gambia (Lead Research Organisation)
- UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD (Collaboration)
- National Institute for Medical Research, Tanzania (Collaboration)
- University of San Francisco (Collaboration)
- Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (Collaboration)
- West African Network for TB, AIDS and Malaria (Collaboration)
- UCSF Medical Center (Collaboration)
- UNIVERSITY OF LIVERPOOL (Collaboration)
- University of Bamako (Collaboration)
- UNIVERSITY OF JOS (Collaboration)
People |
ORCID iD |
Publications
Andreas NJ
(2020)
Performance of metabonomic serum analysis for diagnostics in paediatric tuberculosis.
in Scientific reports
Basu Roy R
(2019)
Tuberculosis susceptibility and protection in children.
in The Lancet. Infectious diseases
Basu Roy R
(2019)
An Auto-luminescent Fluorescent BCG Whole Blood Assay to Enable Evaluation of Paediatric Mycobacterial Responses Using Minimal Blood Volumes.
in Frontiers in pediatrics
Egere U
(2017)
In reply.
in The international journal of tuberculosis and lung disease : the official journal of the International Union against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease
Imam A
(2021)
Conducting clinical research in a resource-constrained setting: lessons from a longitudinal cohort study in The Gambia.
in BMJ global health
Jayasooriya S
(2019)
The burden of non-TB lung disease presenting to TB clinics in The Gambia: preliminary data in the Xpert® MTB/Rif era.
in Public health action
Kampmann B
(2018)
Evaluating UK National Guidance for Screening of Children for Tuberculosis. A Prospective Multicenter Study.
in American journal of respiratory and critical care medicine
Keshavjee S
(2019)
Moving toward Tuberculosis Elimination. Critical Issues for Research in Diagnostics and Therapeutics for Tuberculosis Infection.
in American journal of respiratory and critical care medicine
Description | Participation in NIH workshop on reserach agenda for latent TB infection- represnted paediatric components |
Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
Policy Influence Type | Membership of a guideline committee |
Description | CHILDHOOD 'OMICS' AND MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS-DERIVED BIOSIGNATURES (COMBO) FOR TB DIAGNOSIS IN HIGH HIV PREVALENCE SETTINGS |
Amount | $1,503,586 (USD) |
Funding ID | R01AI152161 |
Organisation | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United States |
Start | 03/2020 |
End | 03/2025 |
Description | HOST PROTEOMIC BIOSIGNATURES FOR A URINE-BASED DIAGNOSIS OF PULMONARY TUBERCULOSIS IN CHILDREN |
Amount | $209,400 (USD) |
Funding ID | K23HL153581 |
Organisation | National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) |
Department | Candidate gene Association Resource (CARe) |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United States |
Start | 08/2020 |
End | 08/2025 |
Description | NIH- Biomarkers for Childhood TB |
Amount | $2,500,000 (USD) |
Organisation | National Institutes of Health (NIH) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United States |
Start | 02/2020 |
End | 01/2024 |
Description | NIH- Biomrker Award PI Levin |
Amount | $2,000,000 (USD) |
Organisation | National Institutes of Health (NIH) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United States |
Start | 01/2018 |
End | 12/2023 |
Description | UKRI-GCRF |
Amount | £150,000 (GBP) |
Organisation | United Kingdom Research and Innovation |
Department | Global Challenges Research Fund |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 03/2020 |
End | 03/2021 |
Description | Validation of Biomarkers of Pediatric TB and further development for use in diagnosis of childhood TB |
Amount | $1,000,208 (USD) |
Funding ID | R01AI128765-02 |
Organisation | National Institutes of Health (NIH) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United States |
Start | 12/2016 |
End | 11/2021 |
Description | WANETAM- network |
Amount | € 2,000,000 (EUR) |
Organisation | European Commission H2020 |
Sector | Public |
Country | Belgium |
Start | 03/2018 |
End | 04/2022 |
Title | R4KA database |
Description | 4-country research database for implementation of the project, data integrity and data sharing on a regular basis |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2018 |
Provided To Others? | No |
Impact | able to share data across the platform of the study and enable data quality control |
Description | COMBO-NIH grant |
Organisation | UCSF Medical Center |
Country | United States |
Sector | Hospitals |
PI Contribution | We are co-investigators on this NIH award and will be contributing samples and data and experience |
Collaborator Contribution | This new grant on which we are co-investigators will discover new biomarkers for childhood TB diagnosis It is a 5-year project |
Impact | not yet |
Start Year | 2020 |
Description | Collaboration with the MRC/GCRF funded network Validate , University of Oxford, UK |
Organisation | University of Oxford |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The MRC/GCRF funded sister "Networks in Vaccine R&D" Hic-Vac, BactiVac, IntVetVacc, Validate and IMPRINT support each other by exchange of knowledge, administrative issues, the network PIs supporting network meeting by presenting their own networks and joint presentation of the networks during the BSI meeting 2017 (please refer to Engagement activities for more details). |
Collaborator Contribution | The MRC/GCRF funded sister "Networks in Vaccine R&D" Hic-Vac, BactiVac, IntVetVacc, Validate and IMPRINT support each other by exchange of knowledge, administrative issues, the network PIs supporting network meeting by presenting their own networks and joint presentation of the networks during the BSI meeting 2017 (please refer to Engagement activities for more details). |
Impact | Joint meeting attendance, exchange of knowledge on reporting to funders and administrative matters. |
Start Year | 2017 |
Description | GCRF Foundation Award partner |
Organisation | National Institute for Medical Research, Tanzania |
Department | NIMR Mbeya Research Centre |
Country | Tanzania, United Republic of |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Grant Facilitates Recruitment site for childhood GCRF grant, MRC Gambia provides training |
Collaborator Contribution | sample collection, policy development |
Impact | ongoing |
Start Year | 2017 |
Description | IMPALA |
Organisation | Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Collaboration on assessment of child lung health |
Collaborator Contribution | Training and expertise |
Impact | new collaboration |
Start Year | 2018 |
Description | Jos |
Organisation | University of Jos |
Department | Department of Paediatrics |
Country | Nigeria |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | We engaged Dr Ebonyi as our partner in the research project and devised the protocol and data system to be implemented on site. We shared our training materials |
Collaborator Contribution | The partners in Jos have enabled implementation of the GCRF work and facilitated close links with the Nigerian National TB Control Program and have led training activities in Nigeria for chidlhood TB as well as informed documentation of implementation of IPT. |
Impact | derived documents now used in National TB programs |
Start Year | 2017 |
Description | NIH grant for biomarkers of chidlhood TB diagnostics |
Organisation | University of San Francisco |
Country | United States |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | this recently awarded NIH grant will allow us ot contribute stored samples form the MRC program grant and GCRF award to the validation of childhood TB diagnostic markers and to prospectively recruit a new cohort of children with TB and community controls |
Collaborator Contribution | The grant is led by the colleagues from the University of San Francisco and we are research partners with a sub contract. |
Impact | none yet |
Start Year | 2020 |
Description | Tanzania |
Organisation | National Institute for Medical Research, Tanzania |
Department | NIMR Mbeya Research Centre |
Country | Tanzania, United Republic of |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Identification of children in households affected by TB through protocols, data collection tools and teaching |
Collaborator Contribution | recruitment of children affected by TB and samples for biomarker studies |
Impact | samples currently undergoing evaluation for novel diagnostics |
Start Year | 2017 |
Description | UKRI-GCRF award for partenrship in chidlhood TB sequelae (just awarded) |
Organisation | University of Liverpool |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | This GCRF grant is held by my postdoc Dr Togun and myself at MRCG@LSHTM. We have small salary portions on it only as overall garnt small and money needed for the activities- hence we give time in lieu to set up this new collaboration to establish a platform to study lung outcome in chidlren who are/were affected by TB |
Collaborator Contribution | This GCRF award has established a partnership with Dr Kevin Mortimer at Liverpool University and his team. The grant is held at MRC Gambia at teh LSHTM. Whilst he has a small salary contribution, his team is contributing in kind in order to set things up for the more substantial application next year. |
Impact | not yet |
Start Year | 2020 |
Description | UNiversity of Bamako |
Organisation | University of Bamako |
Country | Mali |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Identification of children in households affected by TB through protocols, data collection tools and teaching |
Collaborator Contribution | Implementation of contact tracing for children with TB via the National TB program sample collections for biomarker evaluations |
Impact | Implementation of contact tracing for children with TB via the National TB program |
Start Year | 2017 |
Description | WANETAM network |
Organisation | West African Network for TB, AIDS and Malaria |
Country | Senegal |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
PI Contribution | The WANETAM network is an EDCTP funded network across partners in West Africa. My group leads the TB workpackage which has created a platform for the conduct of childhood TB research and funds research and career development for paediatricians and NLTP in the region to invest in better diagnosis and management of childhood TB. Most activities are led by my post doc Dr Toyin Togun who achieved his PhD under the original program grant form MRC to myself, I therefore see this as an impactful outcome. |
Collaborator Contribution | Partners in 7 West African countries are making contributions by dedication time and personnel to the aim of the network package, which is to achieve better diagnosis and management of childhood TB in the region. |
Impact | ongoing, only started in 2019, training delivered, all Ethics through in all countries, MSc student appointed, database designed and shared- now recruiting |
Start Year | 2019 |
Description | Community sensitisation events |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an open day or visit at my research institution |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Participants in your research and patient groups |
Results and Impact | The community sensitisation events are regularly conducted to inform past, present and future participants in our research on the results of previous studies and upcoming new research studies and clinical trials. They serve as a link to the community decision makers and are well supported by community members and MRC researchers. Increased participation in clincial trials and ongoign research |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2010,2011,2012,2013,2014 |
Description | Engagement with local schoolchidlrne aroufn TB in the community |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Schools |
Results and Impact | Several schools have been invited to workshops and information sessions at the MRC Unit to talk about TB, the symptoms, stigma-related issues- these activities are led by a member of our team, Dr Owalabi, who also received small funding for Public engagement from the LSHTM. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019,2020 |
Description | INMIS media interveiw |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | as part of the International Symposium for neonatal and maternal immunisations hick I organised in The Gambia I gave a television interview to the national media which was broadcasted on the same day |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | Kick of meeting Mali , Bamako University |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Kick off meeting for the GCRF award engaged University of Bamako practitioners and the National TB program |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
Description | World TB Day in conjucntion with National TB Program the Gambia |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an open day or visit at my research institution |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Each year our team collaborated with the National TB program in teh Gambia to stage events around World TB Day and to give visibility to all of the TB control activities. These events are always attended by national TV and radio and written up in national newspapers as well as publicised via the mRC comms channels. World TB Day is an international event. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019,2020 |