Global Drug Facility |
The Global Drug Facility is an initiative to increase access to high quality tuberculosis (TB) drugs for DOTS implementation, a TB control strategy. Globally, TB is the leading curable cause of infectious death. The GDF is housed in WHO headquarters in Geneva and managed by a small team in the Stop TB partnership secretariat.
The GDF is not a traditional procurement mechanism. It has adopted a new perspective on TB drug procurement, by linking demand for drugs to supply and monitoring, outsourcing all services to partners on a competitive basis, using product packaging to simplify drug management and linking grants to TB programme performance. The GDF provides a package of services, including technical assistance in TB drug management and monitoring of TB drug use, as well as procurement of high-quality TB drugs at relatively low cost.