BACKGROUND :

Preventable, endemic diseases are rarely prioritized for surveillance as they do not pose a risk of epidemic or pandemic outbreak. This is a failing on two levels: (1) the presence of preventable diseases acts an indicator of the overall state of the health system; and (2) the knowledge of ‘usual’ allows for detection of the unusual. Strengthening surveillance and other systems for endemic diseases, infectious or otherwise, provides necessary infrastructure to combat the existing and target the emerging. In addition, most of these subsisting populations live in close proximity with their animals and experience a double burden, disease in their animals and disease in their families and communities. A pro-poor initiative on a massive scale, control of NTDs has much to offer in terms of what can be adapted, innovated and built in low-resource settings most burdened by NTDs in an agenda that makes poverty alleviation its overarching objective and aims to leave no one behind. 

The success celebrated for some of the NTDs shows that it is possible to build private-public partnerships that lead to concrete results, such as the Global Partners’ Meeting on NTDs based on the theme “Collaborate. Accelerate. Eliminate”. This encapsulates an exemplary informal collaboration that marks a ‘turning point’ in global efforts to control and eliminate poverty-related diseases. 

The discussion will center on forging cross-sectoral partnerships to tackle NTDs and “diseases of poverty”, and will include a range of elements crucial to an effective collaboration across sectors such as financing, research and development, production and delivery of vaccinations and treatment, disease surveillance, role of local communities and other actors on the field. It will elucidate the incentives of building effective cross-sectoral and public-private partnerships by using the case of NTDs. Lessons may be derived from the NTD experience to other areas requiring cross-sectoral partnerships in health where a population-based intervention is appropriate.