The significant burden of drug‑resistant TB has been the major challenge in the Region, where 30% of global multidrug‑resistant TB (MDR‑TB) cases are estimated to occur.  Yet the scale‑up of quality-assured treatment of MDR‑TB has been slow and limited.  While the DOTS strategy remains the cornerstone of TB control, scaling-up of MDR‑TB management is crucial to controlling TB in the Region.  Accelerating the scale‑up of programmatic management of MDR‑TB was strongly recommended by the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) Meeting recently held in Tokyo, Japan, through addressing bottlenecks, such as limited technical and human resource capacity for MDR‑TB management.

As part of the efforts to develop capacity in MDR-TB management in national TB control programmes, the Region conducted two Advanced TB Courses in 2006 and 2007.  Following the success of these two courses, it is proposed to conduct the third Advanced TB Course to further strengthen the capacity of national TB control programmes to scale up quality-assured treatment of MDR‑TB.