Webinar – From progress to sustainability: country-led integration for lasting NTD impact, 30 January 2026

On World Neglected Tropical Diseases Day (30 January 2026), this webinar celebrates the remarkable progress countries have made in addressing neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) through decades of coordinated action by a cohesive global NTD community. Reflecting the World NTD Day theme, “Unite, Act, Eliminate NTDs,” the event highlights the value of collective action, collaboration, and decisive steps toward elimination. Building on past achievements, the webinar emphasizes the importance of strong national leadership and ownership in integrating the planning, delivery, and monitoring of NTD interventions into broader health services and mainstreaming them within primary health care.  

Such integration strengthens sustainability, resilience, and reach, ensuring that interventions are efficient, equitable, and responsive to population needs. Drawing on evidence and country experiences, the webinar showcases practical approaches to NTD integration, providing national health programmes and global partners with insights to sustain momentum, maximize impact, and accelerate progress toward a world free of NTDs. As of early 2026, 58 countries have eliminated at least one NTD, demonstrating that elimination is achievable through country-led, evidence-based integration, guided by the WHO NTD road map 2021–2030. Sustaining and expanding these gains requires coordinated, nationally owned approaches that enhance efficiency and resilience, reduce reliance on parallel programmes and external financing, reinforce global collaboration and health system governance.  

True integration goes beyond co-delivery of services, requiring structural transformation that breaks down programme silos, aligns planning, financing, and service delivery, and ensures a continuum of preventive and curative care across all system levels. Health services should be designed around public health priorities, equity, and sustainability, with holistic, sector-wide planning under government stewardship, alignment of international funding with national priorities, and cross-sectoral approaches to address social determinants of health.  

Integration—understood as a system transformation that incorporates NTD planning, financing, and service delivery into comprehensive national health systems—offers a clear pathway to stronger country ownership, sustainable financing, and improved health system performance. Timely and coordinated action is essential to protect hard-won gains and accelerate progress toward NTD elimination.