Business leaders have launched a new initiative to support the achievement of international tuberculosis (TB) targets by the time that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) expire in 2015.

Earlier this week, the feds finally reached closure with Ranbaxy Laboratories with a $500 million deal to settle criminal and civil charges for a serious and widespread manufacturing ruse. The generic drugmaker was charged with using raw chemicals from unapproved sources, fabricating in-house test data to meet FDA standards and concealing these activities from FDA inspectors by falsifying records (back story).

While the World Health Organization’s latest health numbers show that great progress has been made in improving the health in low-income countries, significant inequalities remain between people living in the richest and poorest countries. Access to even the most basic medicines continues to be a major challenge due to high prices.

Re: Marketing and use of QuantiFERON-TB Gold for active TB in India and high TB burden countries

Pakistani population has deficient knowledge and misconceptions regarding symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, and impact of TB.

Bedaquiline was the first TB drug to be discovered in more than 40 years, and the first one specifically for multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB). MDR-TB arises when the M. tuberculosis bacteria become resistant to two commonly used first-line TB drugs — isonazid and rifampicin.

An international study aimed at identifying new treatment regimens that could shorten the length of TB treatment from six to three months has started in Tanzania and South Africa.

North Korea is facing a surge of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, or MDRTB, an aid group has warned.

Geneva, 8 May 2013 – On the appointment of Roberto Azevedo as Director General of the World Trade Organization, international medical humanitarian organisation Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has warned the WTO and incoming DG that access to medicines must become a priority. This includes allowing least-developed countries to remain exempt from introducing intellectual property rules, and maintaining the right of countries to use all flexibilities at their disposal to ensure access to affordable generic medicines.

New TB target proposed to guide progress after 2015: zero new TB infections, zero TB deaths, zero TB suffering and zero TB stigma and discrimination.