New drug for treament of Tuberculosis emerges

Scientist have recorded another milestone in the search for better treatment for tuberculosis (TB) with combination drug regimen.

The new drug killed more than 99 per cent of patients’ TB bacteria within two weeks and could be more effective than existing treatment.

The results of the Phase II clinical trial of the novel approach published yesterday in London-based medical journal, Lancet, add to a growing body of evidence that the new regimen could reduce treatment by more than a year for some patients.

The findings from researchers and the non-profit TB Alliance raise hope for a treatment breakthrough amid the growing and dangerous epidemic of drug-resistant forms of TB that, in some cases, are becoming untreatable.

The results, presented yesterday at the 2012 International AIDS Conference, also reveal progress in the pursuit of an anti-retroviral-compatible TB treatment, which is critical to treating the millions of people with TB/Human Immuno-deficiency Virus (HIV)/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) co-infection. Today, TB remains the largest killer of people with AIDS, but very often, TB and HIV treatments cannot be given together because of drug-drug interactions and side effects.

The clinical trial tested a combination of one completely novel drug candidate, a new TB drug candidate already approved to treat other infectious diseases, and one existing TB drug. These results, along with pre-clinical data, suggest that this novel combination could treat both drug-susceptible and some forms of drug-resistant TB in only four months. Currently, people with multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB) required 18 to 24 months of treatment. Even those with ordinary TB need six months of taking drugs every day.

TB is one of the world’s most ancient and deadly infectious diseases, dating back thousands of years and found in remains of Egyptian mummies. When HIV/AIDS exploded in the 1980s and 1990s, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, that epidemic triggered a historic jump in the number of TB deaths. An estimated 1.4 million people die from TB, and roughly nine million people develop the disease, each year. One-third of all people on earth—nearly 2.5 billion people—have a latent form of TB.