These are the facts (source: Time to Act-Save a million lives by 2015 brochure) :
At least one out of three people in the world has latent TB infection, which increases the risk of becoming ill with TB.
People living with HIV have an estimated 20 to 30 times greater risk of developing active TB than people without HIV infection.
An estimated 9.4 million people become ill with TB worldwide in 2009, and of these people nearly 3 million, including 1 million people living with HIV, were in Africa.
Some 400 000 people died of HIV-related TB in 2009, which makes TB responsible for one in four AIDS deaths.
On June 6, 2011, the Stop TB Partnership launched the initiative Time to Act–Save a Million Lives by 2015 at the UN Headquarters at a reception hosted by Ray Chambers, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Malaria and UN MDG Advocate. For full coverage of the event, click here.
If you would like to respond to this call to action, visit www.action.org where you can learn more about TB and TB/HIV, about using social media to spread the word, and about donating funds to the fight.