04 Nov AIGHD team takes lead role in successful TB conference

It was a historical week for tuberculosis science, advocacy and research and it happened right here in the Netherlands.

The Union World Conference on Lung Health was held in The Hague from October 24-27. More than 4,000 scientists, advocates, policy makers, health care providers and politicians attended the event – the largest number of delegates ever for this conference.

AIGHD had a lead role, with prof. Frank Cobelens serving as a member of the organizing committee. Frank was also co-organizer for TB Science, an official pre-conference that took place October 23-24. It was the first time in history the event was held as part of the Union World Conference and provided an important platform for attendees to discuss highly topical themes in TB including shorter treatments, vaccine developments and latent infection.

A number of our team members presented during the event including Frank C., Sabine Hermans and Frank van Leth, who co-led a successful symposium hosted by TBnet (above photo). Frank serves as chair of this European research collaboration.

Kamela Ng, Jason Andrews, Ben Patterson, Ineke Spruijt, and Nii Hanson-Nortey, PhD students linked to AIGHD, also presented.

Finally, the Amsterdam TuBerculosis Center (Amsterdam TBC) was launched by the Amsterdam UMC. The center is a collaboration of senior scientists with expertise across the TB spectrum who, through interdisciplinary research and education, seek to build the scientific base required to end TB once and for all. A number of our team members are undertaking research as part of the network.

Congratulations to all our colleagues who helped make the conference a success and for delivering informative and educational presentations and symposiums!