Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) started working in Tajikistan in 1997. In Tajikistan, MSF has tailored its program to focus on improving children’s access to treatment for TB.

Since November 2011, MSF has been working with the Tajik Ministry of Health to diagnose and treat children and their families who are diagnosed with drug-sensitive and drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB), and in 2016, the promising new drugs bedaquiline and delamanid were used for the first time in the country. Currently, 17 patients are on bedaquiline and four on delamanid. These drugs are the first new TB drugs in over 50 years and have less side effects and are more effective than older treatments. MSF also supports the paediatric TB hospital in Dushanbe and the paediatric ward in Machiton hospital.

The project treats children who have both TB and HIV, and TB and severe malnutrition. In 2016, MSF worked with the Ministry of Health to finalise the third version of the paediatric guide for Tajikistan, providing information about best practices for the treatment of children with TB.

In the south of the country, MSF runs the Kulob paediatric HIV and family project. The main objective is to reduce morbidity and mortality of children with HIV/AIDS, with a special focus on co-infections with other diseases and the prevention of HIV transmission.