To ask the Secretary of State for International Development how much his Department has allocated to the Global Plan to Stop TB 2006-15 since the programme was launched; what progress has been made towards the targets in the Plan to Stop TB; and how much of the funding required to implement the Global Plan has been (a) identified and (b) spent. (194960)

[holding answer 17 March 2008]: The Global Plan to Stop Tuberculosis (TB) lays out the actions and resources needed to achieve its target to halve TB prevalence and deaths by 2015. It does not receive funding directly but acts as an umbrella organisation for those involved in TB control.

The World Heath Organisation estimates that globally the number of new cases of TB is falling slowly (less than 1 per cent. a year) and the reported treatment success rate is now 85 per cent.

When launched in 2006, the Global Plan to Stop Tuberculosis (TB) set the overall plan cost at US $56 billion, the estimated funding gap being US $ 31 billion. For its first three years, the Global Plan identified the need for about US $12 billion of which countries have reported US $7.6 billion in available resources.