Worldwide, tuberculosis (TB) is the leading cause of death for people with HIV/AIDS. TB is relatively uncommon in industrialized countries such as the U.S. and Canada, where it is largely concentrated among immigrants and the indigent.

Dr. Alexander von Paleske 16th September 2011
Mpilo-Hospital
Teaching Hospital of the University of Zimbabwe
Department of Haematology
Bulawayo/Zimbabwe
Africa

The TB Europe Coalition and the ACTION Project are giving TB a ‘human face’ in their report ‘Tuberculosis – Voices in the fight against the European epidemic’ by looking behind the statistics to focus on the every-day challenges faced by TB patients and their carers in the WHO Europen Region. TB is a global epidemic, causing devastating loss of life and hampering economic productivity. It is also a European problem, where TB rates have been on the rise over the past few decades.

In this Atlantic Magazine opinion piece, Megan McArdle, senior editor at the Atlantic, echoes a warning by the FDA issued in 2001 which stated, "Unless antibiotic resistance problems are detected as they emerge, and actions are taken to contain them, the world could be faced with previously treatable diseases that have again become untreatable, as in the days before antibiotics were developed."

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria welcomes the endorsement of the “Consolidated Action Plan to prevent and combat MDR TB 2011- 2015” by all 53 European countries, and is committed to fully support its targets and objectives.  As the largest international funder of tuberculosis programs and the largest funder of multidrug-resistant TB treatment (MDR-TB), the Global Fund recognises the strong political will in the countries of the region and the commitment of WHO to tackle the serious challenge of MDR-TB.

Tuberculosis (TB), a contagious disease that spreads through the air, is a worldwide pandemic.

Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) and extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) "are spreading at an alarming rate in Europe and will kill thousands unless health authorities halt the pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday" during the launch of "a new regional plan to find, diagnose and treat cases of the airborne infectious disease more effectively," Reuters reports. "The WHO said that if the plan is fully implemented -- at an estimated cost of $5 billion -- 127,000 people will be successfully treated for drug-resistant TB and 120,000 deaths will be averted by 2015," according to the news agency (Kelland, 9/13).

Today, on the first day of the sixty-first session of the WHO Regional Committee for Europe, WHO/Europe and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria exchanged letters and initiated a joint operational plan for 2011/2012.

Providence, RI--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Beech Tree Labs, Inc. announced today publication of data providing evidence that its novel product candidate addressing scarring and wound healing showed efficacy in a Mycobacterium tuberculosis (TB) animal model.

Civil society groups remain unhappy with the price South Africa is paying for the GeneXpert MTB/RIF – a rapid diagnostic for tuberculosis (TB), multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) and TB in HIV-infected individuals developed by molecular diagnostics company Cepheid. Representatives from the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), The Treatment Action Group, The AIDS Rights Alliance of South Africa and Partners in Health called on Cepheid CEO John Bishop and Dr. Giorgio Roscigno of the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND) – the company that co-developed Xpert with Cepheid – in a letter to do more to make the test affordable in South Africa and to shed some light on the pricing and price negotiation process.