World Humanitarian Day 2025: Ending TB in Times of Crisis
The World Humanitarian Day is observed on 19 August every year to celebrate heroes who step into crises to help others, and to stand with the millions of people whose lives hang in the balance. In recent years, with conflicts worldwide, humanitarian workers are the ones holding the line, keeping people alive, often at great personal risk. But more and more, those who help are becoming targets themselves. Therefore, this year’s message and intention to observe the day is to acknowledge and support the humanitarian system, which is stretched beyond its limits, underfunded, overwhelmed and under attack. The theme for World Humanitarian Day 2025, #ActForHumanity, is to demand protection, accountability, and action with the support of the global humanitarian community.
While humanitarian attention often focuses on urgent calls to save people from bombings and hunger, the long-term consequences, such as lack of healthcare, lack of vaccinations, and the resurgence of preventable infectious diseases, are frequently overlooked. Tuberculosis is one of the diseases that is difficult to track and treat during conflicts, which can cause an increase in the number of undiagnosed cases among refugee communities and can spill over to host communities causing long-term health consequences. For example, in Syria, forced mass displacement and systematic violations of humanitarian law have resulted in overcrowding and the destruction of key infrastructure. These crises led to an increased risk of both drug-sensitive and resistant TB, while restricting the ability to diagnose, trace contacts, treat, and follow-up. The official figure for 2017 for TB cases was 19 per 100, 000 is likely a vast underestimate compared to the pre-conflict figure of 22 per 100,000 population, given the challenges and barriers to case detection. Limited diagnostics also affected the diagnosis of multidrug- and rifampicin-resistant TB, reported as comprising 8.8% of new diagnoses in 2017. Similar scenarios could be observed in Sudan, where tuberculosis continues to pose a serious threat to public health amid systemic health-care collapse. In 2024 alone, the Federal Ministry of Health in Sudan officially reported 14,310 new tuberculosis cases, reflecting the persistence of the disease with widespread insecurity and disruption of services.
Amid ongoing conflicts in Palestine, Ukraine, Myanmar, and beyond, it is our collective duty as a community committed to ending TB to stand together, support and celebrate humanitarian efforts, and use our TBPPM platform to amplify the voices of the unheard and #ActForHumanity.