The Netherlands, September 26th-27th
In September 2019, to mark a year since the UN High-Level Meeting on TB, Serhii Kiral, Co-Chair of the Eurasian Parliamentary Group on TB, Alesia Matusevych & Kate Thompson, members of the Global TB Caucus Secretariat, travelled to the Netherlands for a joint delegation with KNCV Tuberculosis Foundation (KNCV).
The visit aimed to facilitate engagement between Caucus members within the European region, particularly Anne Kuik, Dutch TB Champion, and help to ensure sustainable parliamentary engagement in the Netherlands on this topic.
On Thursday the delegation travelled to Rotterdam to participate in the World of Health Care (WOHC) event. The WOHC event was organised by a coalition of Dutch civil society to highlight the role of international collaboration in achieving SDG 3, which aims to ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages. Upon arrival the Caucus delegation decided to take part in an interactive discussion about how to resolve various public healthcare scenarios in Malaysia and Kenya. Our topic was Antimicrobial Resistance in Malaysia, allowing Serhii Kiral to draw upon his experiences as the Special Rapporteur on Multi-Drug Resistant TB in Europe for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. Serhii Kiral was invited to be a panelist in the session ‘Public-Private Partnerships: Delivering Innovations & Ensuring Lasting Impact’ which took place later in the day, and involved a lively discussion on previous examples of positive engagement by the private sector and how these can be replicated.
Afterward the delegation returned to The Hague to allow Serhii Kiral and Kate Thompson to meet with Isabelle Diks, a member of the Dutch parliament with an interest in sexual and reproductive health & rights.
On Friday the GTBC delegation joined a KNCV delegation to Radboudumc in Nijmegen. Radboudumc is a leading centre for research into TB in the Netherlands, with experts focusing particularly on Childhood TB & multi-drug resistant TB. The delegation were given a tour of the hospital and laboratories. The visit concluded with a discussion of how to create sustainable relationships between civil society, academics and parliamentarians.