During the sixth annual meeting in Abu Dhabi, UAE, in September 2015, ICTC and other members of the Neglected Tropical Disease (NTD) Nongovernmental Development Organization (NGDO) Network (NNN) declared their full and unanimous support for a global indicator for NTDs for Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3, Target 3.3, reflecting language endorsed by the World Health Organization and the NTD community.
The Abu Dhabi Declaration
More than 1.4 billion of the world’s poorest people suffer from NTDs, including 500 million children. These diseases perpetuate poverty by causing blindness, malnutrition, anemia, disfigurement, and disability — preventing children from attending school and parents from going to work. The NNN is a global forum for NGDOs working to meet international targets to control or eliminate NTDs such as onchocerciasis, lymphatic filariasis, schistosomiasis, soil transmitted helminthiasis, trachoma, and leprosy. Our continued and active collaboration is a critical component of efforts to reduce extreme poverty.
NGDOs are uniquely placed, given their field-based programs and experience, to assist in reaching the world's most underserved populations, like those suffering from NTDs. The NNN promotes comprehensive approaches that prevent, treat, and manage consequences of diseases that affect the poorest of the poor. Prevention activities include hygiene behavior change, promoting access to water and sanitation as well as integrating interventions within the education sector school feeding programs to tackle malnutrition. Preventive chemotherapy for NTDs is typically administered through mass drug administration using donated medicines from several major global pharmaceutical companies, including Eisai, GSK, Johnson & Johnson, MSD, Merck Serono, and Pfizer. Management of consequences from NTDs is a continuum of care that includes morbidity management, community-based rehabilitation, and stigma reduction.
Guided by a shared commitment to equitable and sustainable development, members are committed to working closely together to combat NTDs and reaffirm their support of the following activities:
- Support governments to achieve control and elimination targets of endemic NTDs
- Finalize baseline disease mapping
- Scale up of mass drug administration and behavior change activities for sustained impact
- Implementing field ready tools and practices informed by clinical and operational research and the best available data
- Align NTD programs with nutrition, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) programs where appropriate to help break the cycle of disease and enable appropriate care for those suffering from NTDs
- Strengthen health systems, especially at the community level, by empowering communities to control disease through provision of services, training community health workers, and implementing information, communication and education campaigns.
- Scale up efforts to address the need for surgical intervention and home based care for those suffering from NTDs, and reduce NTD-related stigma and discrimination
- Promote gender equity and the inclusion of people with NTD-related disabilities in mainstream services and development programs, and of people with disabilities in all NTD programs
- Develop clear guidelines as to where and when to stop treatment to achieve elimination targets
In support of the proposed global indicator for NTDs under SDG 3, Target 3.3, and the SDGs in general, members also affirm their commitment to:
- Support data collection for the NTD Global Indicator
- Support ministries of health to analyze and publish the results of the data collected
- Work in partnership with key stakeholders and decision makers, nationally and internationally to achieve control and elimination targets through prioritization of NTDs
- Support the implementation of the WHO WASH and NTDs Strategy and Action Plan 2015 - 2020, launched at this meeting.
Endorsed by NNN NGDO Members:
American Leprosy Missions
Bill Simmons, President and CEO
Austrian Leprosy Relief Association
Matthias Wittrock, Managing Director
Blantyre Institute for Community Ophthalmology
Khumbo Kalua, Director
The Carter Center
Amb. (ret.) Mary Ann Peters, CEO
CBM
Babar Qureshi, Director of Neglected Tropical Diseases and Senior Medical Advisor
The Children's Investment Fund Foundation
Michael Anderson
Children Without Worms
David Addiss, Director
Kim Koporc, Director, Program Implementation
DAHW Deutsche Lepra- und Tuberkulosehilfe e.V.
GLRA German Leprosy and Tuberculosis Relief Association
Burkard Kömm, Geschäftsführer/Chief Executive Officer
Evidence Action
Grace Hollister
Fairmed
René Staeheli, Director
Fontilles
Jose Manuel Amorós, Manager
The Fred Hollows Foundation
Brian Doolan, Chief Executive Officer
Heart to Heart Foundation
Yoon Juhee, Director
IMA World Health
Rick Santos, President and Chief Executive Officer
International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness
Peter Ackland. Chief Executive Officer
International Coalition for Trachoma Control
Virginia Sarah, Chair
International Trachoma Initiative
Paul Emerson, Director
Kilimanjaro Centre for Community Ophthalmology International
Paul Courtright
LEPRA Society
Ashim Chowla
LEPRA
Sarah Nancollas, Chief Executive
The Leprosy Mission International
Geoff Warne, General Director
The Leprosy Mission England and Wales
Sian Arulanantham, Head of Programmes Coordination
Light for the World
Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Filariasis Program Support Unit
Charles Mackenzie, Director
The Magrabi Foundation
Christina Sanko, Director of Development and Partnerships
Mectizan Donation Program
Adrian Hopkins, Director
Netherlands Leprosy Relief
Jan van Berkel, Director
Orbis
Andrew Wardle, Program Manager
Organisation pour la Prevention de la Cecite (OPC)
Karim Bengraïne
RTI International
Lisa Rotondo, ENVISION Project Director
NNN Chair
Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation
Etsuko Kita, Chair
Schistosomiasis Control Initiative
Wendy Harrison, Managing Director
NNN Vice-Chair
Secours aux Lépreux - Leprosy Relief Canada
Maryse Legault, Director
Sightsavers International
Caroline Harper, CEO
WaterAid
United Front Against River Blindness
Daniel Shungu, Director
University of Melbourne
Indigenous Eye Health Melbourne School of Population and Global Health
Hugh Taylor, Melbourne Laureate Professor
World Vision International
Mesfin Teklu Tessema, Partnership Leader, Health and Nutrition
Yonsei University College of Medicine
Sangchul Yoon, Ophthalmologist
Observers
Damien Foundation
Alex Jaucot, General Director a.i.
Malaria Consortium, Nigeria
Kolawole Maxwell, Country Director
National Institute for Pharmaceutical Research & Development
Mercy N. Ezeunala
National Podoconiosis Action Network
Biruk Kebede
Parasitology and Public Health Society of Nigeria
Ukaga Chinyere