Infection Watch

Research Priorities To Fight Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis

Link: Research Priorities To Fight Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis.

Tuberculosis (TB) has long been one of the world's great killers. Now, forms of drug-resistant TB--multidrug (MDR) and extensively drug-resistant (XDR)--are occurring at an ominous and accelerating rate. To help in the fight against drug-resistant TB, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, has formulated an MDR and XDR TB research agenda.

A summary of the agenda, authored by NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, M.D., and members of the NIAID Tuberculosis Working Group, is now available online in The Journal of Infectious Diseases.

"The TB diagnostic tools in use today are antiquated, slow and insensitive; TB drug regimens are complex and lengthy; and the only vaccine available does not provide effective protection against adult pulmonary TB," says Dr. Fauci. "The challenge of TB control is further compounded by the rise of drug-resistant TB, and we anticipate that the NIAID Research Agenda for Multidrug-Resistant and Extensively Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis will contribute substantively to the fight against this emerging threat."

Drug Resistant TB Rising Globally, WHO Survey

Link: Drug Resistant TB Rising Globally, WHO Survey.

A new survey by the World Health Organization (WHO) has found the highest rates ever recorded for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) globally are occurring today. This is the largest survey on drug resistant TB ever to be conducted, the data for which was collected between 2002 and 2006.

The survey, published Monday 26th February and titled Anti-tuberculosis drug resistance in the world, covers 90,000 TB patients in 81 countries and also found that 45 countries have recorded cases of extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis ((XDR-TB). This is the first time the WHO survey has covered this virtually untreatable form of TB, and because many countries are not equipped to diagnose it, the real picture could be worse.

TB is an infectious airborne respiratory disease caused by a bacteria that is spread by the coughing of infected people. Despite the disease being preventable and curable, 8.8 million people caught it and 1.6 million died in 2005.