World NTD Day 2022 and a new Kigali Declaration to galvanise commitment to end neglected tropical diseases

Abstract

WHO’s 2021–2030 NTD roadmap and the need for a new Declaration on Neglected tropical diseases Building on achieved progress, WHO launched its second 2021–2030 NTD roadmap in January 2021, to further accelerate programmatic action, but also to introduce important paradigm shifts to ensure long-term impact, such as the need to intensify cross-cutting approaches—both within and beyond the health sector, and to change operating models to facilitate country ownership and sustainability [5]. The launch of a new NTD roadmap also implicitly called for a new high-level political declaration in order to mobilise political will and secure commitments to deliver the goals set out in the WHO NTD roadmap and achieve the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target 3.3 on NTDs (a reduction by 90% of people requiring interventions against NTDs by 2030). Following the establishment of the Global Parliamentary Group to Combat NTDs, Uniting and Wellcome Trust were pleased to host a session at the UNITE Global Summit 2021 on building political will to reach the WHO Roadmap targets and end NTDs. https://unitingtocombatntds.org/news/unitesummit/.