NEWS ALERT - 28 October 2024 l Geneva, Switzerland
GENEVA, 28 October 2024 - The Stop TB Partnership hosted a global Hackathon, “Innovation to End TB”, in Geneva on October 22-23, 2024. This is the first time that the Stop TB Partnership has used the hackathon format to tackle an issue - TB stigma, a powerful force of social exclusion that has long hindered efforts to end TB.
A hackathon is an event where people come together to collaborate to solve a problem or identify new opportunities, through bringing people from different sectors and backgrounds together to collaborate intensively over a short period to create solutions for a specific challenge or problem.
For the Hackathon: Innovation to End TB Stigma, Stop TB Partnership invited over 25 participants, including TB survivors, students, private sector innovators, journalists, lawyers, artists, influencers, and community organisers, to identify solutions to eliminate TB stigma. Over 30 ideas were pitched by various teams, with 5 being selected as the best. Ideas included TV, media and film productions to “normalise” TB, using food delivery models as models for delivering support services, public interest litigation, engagement of humourists, AI chatbots, partnering with fashion brands, leveraging 'contagious' musical numbers, normalising and rebranding TB and the notion of living with it.
The hackathon's outcomes will be presented at the 38th Stop TB Partnership Board Meeting in December 2024 in Abuja, Nigeria.
“Stigma is a gap in a collective consciousness, or disconnection in the society” Paulina Siniatikina, TB Survivor
“TB shuts you up, and TB stigma shuts you down”, Caroline Wangarimburu, TB Survivor.
“We need to think about ending TB stigma as a public health intervention and just a social change necessity”, Kinz-el-Eman, DOPASI Foundation.
A key input to this initiative is the TB Stigma Assessment, developed by the Stop TB Partnership with support from USAID. Launched in 2020, this tool measures levels and manifestations of TB stigma across different settings and highlights its impact on accessing care and support services. The assessment has already been implemented in over ten countries, providing a solid evidence base that underscores the urgent need for innovative solutions to address TB stigma.
The hackathon also reinforces the Stop TB Partnership’s commitment to ensuring that no one is left behind in the global fight against TB, which is part of the United Nations (UN) broader Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the End TB Strategy.
The 2023 United Nations Political Declaration on the Fight Against TB and the recently passed United Nations Political Declaration on the Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) explicitly acknowledge the damaging effects of stigma on vulnerable populations, particularly in poverty-stricken or conflict-affected regions and calls for ending it by the end of 2027. Stigma prevents individuals from seeking timely care and deepens social and economic inequalities, further marginalising those who are most at risk.
This event is a critical milestone in the Stop TB Partnership’s efforts to achieve the 2027 target for ending TB stigma, towards ending TB by 2030.
