New TB treatment breakthroughs must reach those in-need without delay

Shobha Shukla – CNS
Contd from previous issue
All of them had highly drug-resistant TB - a form of TB that previously required 20 to 24 months to treat with associated cure rates between 40-50% in the field, and alarmingly high rates of toxicity. This study demonstrated that treatment success rate with the all oral BPaL regimen was over 90%, treatment duration was reduced to one-fourth of the previous regimen (6 months compared to 20-24 months), and much reduced drug-related toxicities. There is still work to be done for even better treatments.
The BPaL regimen to treat highly drug resistant forms of TB has been endorsed by the UN health agency, the World Health Organization (WHO) for use under operational research conditions. Earlier, United States FDA and European regulators had already given the green signal for the use of this regimen. Recently the Indian regulators have also given a thumbs up to Pretomanid and shorter regimens.
However, we have to remember that the number of participants in ZeNix study was relatively small, given the burden of TB in the real world. Dr Conor cautioned that “we do not think we feel comfortable making a definitive casual statement about the relationship between the different doses of Linezolid and the incidence of toxicity, but I think we would feel confident to draw attention to the association between higher rates of toxicity with the higher doses of Linezolid.”
He added that “it is unacceptable for people to die from an infection that could theoretically be treated”.
(To be contd)