Seasoned global health leader brings over 26 years of expertise in complex, multi-stakeholder projects 

Baltimore, January 16, 2025 — Leader in combatting global infectious diseases Kelly Curran is joining USAID-funded Supporting, Mobilizing, and Accelerating Research for Tuberculosis Elimination (SMART4TB) as Project Director on January 27.  

Former senior director for HIV and Infectious Diseases at Jhpiego, Curran’s career spans a variety of global health’s most pressing issues, from women’s health to HIV, COVID-19, and mpox, working with key stakeholders including country ministries of health, donors, multilateral agencies, researchers, clinicians and affected communities. Driven by a passion for transforming global health on the ground, Curran’s roles have involved designing and implementing effective multi-country programs, leading multidisciplinary teams, directing operations, and conducting research with life-saving results.  

“Kelly Curran has an extraordinary record of developing and implementing programs that have changed the trajectory of population health in countries afflicted with high burdens of communicable diseases and health inequities,” said Richard Chaisson, SMART4TB chief of party and professor of medicine and public health at Johns Hopkins University.  

“SMART4TB will benefit enormously from the depth of experience and innovative problem solving that Kelly has brought to some incredibly complex challenges,” said Payam Nahid, SMART4TB senior research advisor and Haile T. Debas distinguished professor of global health and executive director of the UCSF Institute for Global Health Sciences. “Her knowledge, passion, and energy will undoubtedly drive us forward in exciting new ways.” 

Curran’s most recent role involved overseeing the $391 million PEPFAR/USAID-funded Reaching Impact, Saturation and Epidemic control project, which is focused on supporting national HIV, COVID-19, mpox, and Marburg virus responses. In this project, she helped introduce 3HP TB preventive treatment for people living with HIV, and long-acting HIV prevention products in low- and middle-income countries with nurse-led service delivery models.  

“The global responses to COVID-19, HIV, and malaria show that we can change the course of an epidemic when scientific advances in diagnostics, therapeutics and prevention reach the people who need them most,” said Curran. “I am thrilled to join the SMART4TB team, and the global TB response, at this pivotal moment when so much scientific progress is being made against the world’s leading infectious disease killer.”   

Curran comes to SMART4TB at an exciting moment, as several multi-country treatment trials, vaccine preparedness, airborne infection control, and operational research projects are launching.  

Several promising tuberculosis (TB) vaccine candidates are in late-stage clinical trials and have the potential to accelerate the global community’s efforts to curb and ultimately end the disease. But vaccines can only save lives and prevent transmission if they are widely used, making preparation for the rollout of a TB vaccine critical. SMART4TB is proud to introduce the TB vaccine preparedness repository, which will facilitate coordination of research taking place on adult and adolescent TB vaccine preparedness.

The repository tracks completed, ongoing, and planned projects from across the globe, focusing on research that examines preparation for a new TB vaccine. The repository is updated semi-annually, with stakeholders reporting on ongoing and planned projects. If you would like to be added to this list, or have projects to add to the repository, or a question, please contact Joeri Buis at joeri.buis@kncvtbc.org.

Visit the repository HERE.

SMART4TB is proud to launch CABLab, a self-paced online curriculum for people looking to increase their knowledge to engage more deeply–or for the first time!–in TB advocacy and research. Built in collaboration with our regional Community Advisory Board partners, Afrocab, APCASO, and Eurasian Community for Access to Treatment (ECAT), CABLab covers a broad spectrum of topics, from vaccines to research fundamentals.

Through a mix of articles, videos, and interactive materials, along with opportunities for digital interaction and sharing, CABLab provides a forum where interested advocates can come together to continue expanding their TB knowledge.

CABLab will be launching in English on November 20, 2024, with French and Russian translations available in early 2025 but you can start registering now. We hope to expand to more languages in the coming years.

Register for CABLab HERE.

 

 

SMART4TB and the BETTER Project co-hosted a two-day meeting in Johannesburg last week to address the growing issue of expanded resistance to TB drugs. Bedaquiline, clofazimine, delamanid, linezolid, and pretomanid are the backbones of shorter, safer, more effective regimens for rifampin-resistant TB. However, resistance to them poses enormous challenges for affected individuals and the clinicians and programs who treat them.

Leading front-line clinicians, affected community members, and representatives from national TB programs convened to share experiences and develop best practices for this rising concern. They discussed the complicated decision-making process involved in treating and receiving treatment for a type of TB with limited options. This involved weighing the side effects and risks against the goals for the person living with TB, the physician, and the national TB program. They concluded that structured approaches to care for people living with expanded resistance to TB drugs should include:

• Timely access to genomic sequencing to identify drug-resistance mutations to enable early detection of expanded resistance to guide treatment;
• Wraparound care with holistic counseling and shared decision-making between the healthcare provider and person living with expanded drug resistance;
• Urgent development of equitable programs, developed in consultation with key affected communities, for pre-approval access to new drugs. These programs should include both clinical trials and compassionate use. The BETTER Project stands ready to provide clinical support to these programs and calls on drug developers and donors to prioritize this work; and
• Data collection using common elements and existing shared platforms to capture the extent of expanded resistance and outcomes to inform evidence-based policymaking.

SMART4TB and BETTER will produce a clinical field guide in the coming months, further detailing the above practices. If you are interested in receiving the field guide and learning more about our joint efforts, sign up for SMART4TB updates or follow us on LinkedIn. We will also distribute the field guide on our website and through TB listservs. If you are a provider treating expanded DR-TB, please contact Jen Furin at jenniferfurin@gmail.com and if you are a survivor and want to share your story, please contact Rekha Radhakrishnan at rradhak5@jh.edu.

Studies led by local, early-career researchers are linked to national public health priorities 

BALTIMORE AND SOWETO, September 9, 2024 —The Supporting, Mobilizing, and Accelerating Research for Tuberculosis Elimination (SMART4TB) Consortium is proud to announce the launch of two innovative operational research projects to improve TB prevention and early treatment in contacts of people with TB. The studies, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), followed a call for proposals from South African investigators to develop concepts for advancing the South African National TB Program’s research priorities.

“We’re thrilled to advance these important, locally developed concepts, all while nurturing the growth of early career investigators,” said Dr. Neil Martinson, executive director of the Perinatal HIV Research Unit in Soweto, South Africa and SMART4TB Consortium member.

The first study, Participatory Approaches to Strengthen Implementation of Contact Tracing and Treatment for TB or PACT-TB, will characterize barriers and enablers to delivering contact tracing and treatment services in Khayelitsha, Western Cape, and using participatory research methods, will co-develop interventions to increase contact tracing, testing and treatment. “TB Proof is passionate about partnering with communities affected by TB to advance implementation of the latest research,” remarked Ingrid Schoeman, PACT-TB lead and director of TB Proof, an advocacy organization started in 2012 by health workers who developed occupational TB. “And as a TB survivor myself, the chance to lead a research project to improve TB detection and prevention in people who are at high risk from close contact with TB is especially meaningful.”

The second study, led by Thobani Ntshiqa, a PhD candidate affiliated with the Aurum Institute, will evaluate the prognostic value of tuberculosis infection tests in predicting progression of infection to active TB disease among people who have close household contact with someone with TB. “TB preventive therapy uptake is stubbornly low in South Africa, with only 6% of household contacts of people with TB starting treatment,” noted Ntshiqa. “Predicting the progression of tuberculosis infection to active disease would help triage, prioritize and optimize the delivery of preventive therapy strategies among household contacts in high TB and HIV burden settings.”

A call for proposals released in December 2023 solicited applications for innovative operational research related to TB prevention, treatment and care to assist and support the National TB Program’s Research Priorities for TB in South Africa. The call targeted investigators who received their most recent degree within the last 10 years or are new to TB research. SMART4TB received more than 10 applications, which were carefully reviewed by a panel of 16 independent reviewers, representing SMART4TB technical experts, leaders from research and policy organizations and a South African member of Afrocab, one of SMART4TB’s regional community advisory boards.

“Both of these projects reflect some of our country’s biggest challenges in TB and their results will influence our strategies for detection and prevention going forward,” said Professor Norbert Ndjeka, chief director: TB Control & Management at the National Department of Health in South Africa.

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The SMART4TB Consortium brings together experts in TB tools development, implementation science, capacity strengthening, civil society engagement and policy translation. Led by Johns Hopkins University, consortium members include University of California, San Francisco, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, KNCV Tuberculosis Foundation, and Treatment Action Group.

SMART4TB is made possible by the support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents of this press release are the sole responsibility of SMART4TB and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government or consortium collaborators or members.