Sidelined during the COVID-19 pandemic, the country’s deadliest disease has been working under cover.

Adding an antibody to the widely-used tuberculosis vaccine significantly improves its long-term effectiveness, research in mouse models has shown.

Tuberculosis is the second most common cause of death worldwide by an infectious pathogen after Covid-19, but many aspects of its long history with humans remain controversial. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and Arizona State University in Tempe, USA,  found that ancient tuberculosis discovered in archaeological human remains from South America is most closely related to a variant of tuberculosis associated today with seals, but surprisingly these cases were found in people who lived nowhere near the coast. This implies that these cases were not the result of direct transmission from seals, and instead one, or more, spillover events were likely to be the primary drivers of human infection.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is seeking experts to serve as members of the Technical advisory group on development of a WHO roadmap for global introduction of new TB vaccines.

Donors at the Seventh Replenishment Preparatory Meeting (23-24 February 2022) were urged to pledge billions of dollars to get the fight against HIV, TB and malaria “back on track” after health systems and key programs were devastated by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Global Fund warned the meeting’s delegates that unless donors make an unprecedented total funding pledge of at least $18 billion this year, the global goal of ending the three epidemics by 2030 will not be met.

GENEVA – The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has approved US$30 million to top up its Emergency Fund, including US$15 million to support the continuity of HIV and TB prevention, testing and treatment services in Ukraine. This is on top of the US$119.4 million allocated to Ukraine to support the fight against HIV and TB in the country over the 2020-2022 period, and of the US$46.6 million granted for the COVID-19 response since the pandemic broke out.

Public Health Action is the free access, online journal of The International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease. The journal focuses on TB, lung health, non-communicable diseases and related public health issues.

A UCL-led international trial exploring the effectiveness of tuberculosis (TB) treatment in children has led to a change in the World Health Organisation’s global guidelines for managing the disease.

On 24 March 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Society of Radiology (ISR) along with the World Federation of Pediatric Imaging (WFPI) will host a special World TB Day 2022 scientific symposium: Updated WHO guidelines on the management of tuberculosis in children and adolescents: the role of chest radiography to mark the release of updated WHO guidance.

In high-income countries like Canada, patients with subclinical pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) are a heterogeneous group, accounting for one-fifth of all pulmonary TB culture-positive cases, according to findings published in Chest.