World TB Day, 24 March 2003 and TB surveillance in Europe

The theme of World TB day 2003 - "DOTS cured me – it will cure you too!" promotes the worldwide expansion of directly observed treatment-short course (DOTS), a multi pronged TB control strategy including the adoption of standardised patient management and the evaluation of treatment outcome of TB patients. Treatment outcome is a core surveillance indicator recommended to assess the implementation of DOTS. In recent years, DOTS has been adopted increasingly in European countries, especially in the East. The EuroTB annual report 2000 (in press, http://www.eurotb.org/) includes data on treatment outcome for TB cases notified in 1999 in 30 of the 51 countries of the World Health Organization (WHO) European Region. The WHO Global Tuberculosis Control report, available from 24 March 2003 at http://www.who.int/gtb/publications/globrep/index.html, contains current information on the DOTS situation in Europe and the rest of the world.