EDITORIAL
Since the resumption of inclusions, TB-Speed has been able to maintain the activities despite an overall drop in sick children attending the TB-Speed study sites. Fortunately, the project obtained a 1 year no-cost extension by both Unitaid and L’Initiative. The official TB-Speed project end date is now September 2022. The new key dates concerning the different outputs are detailed in the “News on the project” section of this newsletter.
Despite these delays and time lags, the TB-Speed project was able to contribute with data and experience to the revision of the 2021 WHO pediatric TB guidelines and operational handbook. The project contributed with data on the diagnostic accuracy of Xpert Ultra from gastric aspirate and stool, shared confidential and preliminary results on acceptability and feasibility on the nasopharyngeal aspirate and stool specimen collection, on the head-to-head comparison of different stool processing methods before Xpert Ultra testing and experience in decentralising childhood TB diagnosis.
At the same time, TB-Speed is preparing for the Union Conference on Lung Health of October 2021: the last one before the end of the project. 7 contributions to the Union 2021 were accepted: 2 symposia, 2 oral presentations and 3 E-Posters. A late breaker abstract was submitted, primary endpoint results of the TB-Speed pneumonia study.
This is a great opportunity to start presenting the first project results, despite the delay due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The project extension postponed the dates of the international and national result dissemination symposia. The international dissemination symposium will take place June 8-10, 2022 in Maputo, Mozambique, and national dissemination symposia will be organized in each country in July 2022.
TB-Speed – Newsletter 4 – September 2021
