mediatour Fall 2004

2004 U.S. Media Tour

From September 20th through September 29th 2004, Dr. Marcos Espinal, Executive Secretary and Thaddeus Pennas, Advocacy Officer for the Stop TB Partnership traveled to Washington D.C., New York, Indianapolis, and Los Angeles as part of a US Media Tour to meet with US legislators, Stop TB partners, stakeholders and the media to raise awareness and advocate for increased funding for TB. TB funding levels from the US Congress have been stagnate or declining for a number of years. International TB funding via USAID has been frozen at $85 million dollars a year for the past four years and domestic US funding via CDC is facing a $5-6 million dollar cut in FY 2005 budget. The Stop TB Partnership secretariat, working in close collaboration with US partners, agreed that a US Media Tour by Executive Secretary Marcos Espinal would be an opportunity to raise the profile of TB, advocate for more financial support and begin to develop a common legislative and advocacy strategy with US partners.

 

Legislative Efforts

Senate staffers including Representative Sherrod Brown were scheduled. These meetings proved fruitful as they produced pledges of support for sustained TB funding during the upcoming Joint House and Senate Conference Committee meetings deliberating infectious disease section of US Foreign Assistance bill. These meetings also illustrated the need to develop a common, long-term legislative strategy to increase TB funding for FY 2006 and beyond.

 

Media Attention

The tour also was very successful in generating media interest as a number of editorial board meetings and interviews were conducted with Newsweek, Associated Press, Script Howard News Service, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, L. A. Times, Washington Times, National Public Radio, Indianapolis Star, Evansville Courier Press, Fort Wayne Sentinel and the Voice of America. These meetings and interviews focused attention on the need to increase funding for TB by the US Congress and centered on four key topic areas:

  1. GDF and its achievement of three million patient treatments approved in three years;
  2. the erosion of domestic TB funding;
  3. the static US funding level for international TB control; and,
  4. the need for new TB tools.

Five stories have been published to date with firm commitments for an additional five articles or news features to be published in the coming weeks.

 

Partner Engagement

A critical component of the US Media Tour was the engagement of partners in developing a common legislative and advocacy strategy. Fran du Melle and ATS/NCET hosted an organizing meeting to plan for a full US partner meeting, scheduled for 15-16 November, to design a common legislative agenda strategy for 2005. This legislative strategy, (once agreed upon) will focus attention in three subject areas: 1) international "DOTS Expansion" goals (including GDF, STOP TB, etc.); 2) US domestic goals; 3) new tools goals; and 4) determine types of advocacy activities to support the legislative strategy.

Additional meetings were conducted with new partners like WorldSpace Corporation, the Academy for Educational Development, UCLA/Globalization Research Center-Africa, American Red Cross, Bono's NGO "Debt, AIDS, Trade and Africa" DATA, Laurie Garrett of Council of Foreign Relations, Global Health Council and the Earth Institute at Columbia University to engage them in the fight against TB with other US partners consulted on this trip such as Open Society Institute, USAID, RESULTS, Gates Foundation, Eli Lilly.

The trip was organized in close collaboration with partners RESULTS, ATS, Global Health Council, Global Alliance for TB Drug Development, American Red Cross, CDC, Open Society Institute, Eli Lilly and others.

 
This issue can be found online at communique 39 www.stoptb.org
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