RESIST-TB released its May 2020 newsletter with the latest research publications on drug-resistant TB.

The International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (The Union) released its May 2020 newsletter, summarizing the activities carried out during the month.

You are invited to participate in a civil society-led survey on the impact of COVID-19 on TB programs and services around the world.

The current trials testing broad-spectrum antibiotics before treating tuberculosis are not aligned with protocols designed to minimize the use of antibiotics, according to a paper published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

The following is a heavily abridged version of Peter Sands’ remarks to the 43rd Board Meeting 14-15 May – the first Board meeting to be held virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the six weeks before South Africa responded its first diagnoses of COVID-19 with the start of physical distancing measures, more than 47,000 people on average there were tested for tuberculosis with the rapid and reliable Xpert diagnostic tool each week. An average of more than 3,700 of those tests identified active tuberculosis in people who could then access treatment. In the weeks that followed, as the government closed schools and restricted international travel as well as mass gatherings, before launching what Reuters news service called “one of the world’s toughest lockdowns,” restricting all but essential movement from home, and bringing public transportation to a virtual standstill, the numbers of people accessing the rapid test for tuberculosis dropped by nearly half, with an average of a little more than 24,000 tests a week. The accompanying decline in the resulting number of tuberculosis diagnoses was “less dramatic,” than the testing drop, an analysis from South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases notes, likely because people feeling sick with advanced disease were more motivated to overcome the restrictions on movement to seek care. Still tuberculosis diagnoses dropped by 33%.

Organizations are invited to sign on to a Call to Action on HIV, TB and COVID-19 developed by Frontline AIDS, ARASA, Global Coalition of TB Activists and TBpeople, alongside community organizations.

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ, May 27, 2020 — The Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted approval for a new pediatric formulation of SIRTURO^® (bedaquiline). SIRTURO^® is now indicated for use as part of combination therapy in the treatment of adult and pediatric patients (5 years and older and weighing at least 15 kg) with pulmonary multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR‑TB). In the U.S., the medicine should be reserved for use when an effective treatment regimen cannot otherwise be provided.

27 May 2020, Geneva, Switzerland –  On 28 October 2019, the Stop TB Partnership announced the addition of pretomanid to the Global Drug Facility (GDF) catalog as part of a BPaL regimen containing bedaquiline, pretomanid, and linezolid. GDF supplies pretomanid to countries in accordance with WHO recommendations for people with extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) when used under operational research conditions.