The clinical results of a new combination treatment that could dramatically shorten the length of tuberculosis treatment were presented at a recent scientific conference in the USA. This virulent disease of the lungs still infects millions every year, with a notable resurgence in Europe, especially in the East.
Delegates at the 45th Annual Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy (ICAAC), held in Washington DC last month, heard that phase II trials of a gatifloxacin-containing regimen are showing positive results. It is significantly more potent than the current recommended regime of isoniazid, rifampicin, pyrazinamide and ethambutol, which may trim one-third off the six-month treatment regime.
“We are working to bring together public and private partners to speed development for this new treatment,” says Dr Robert Ridley, director of the World Health Organization-based Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR). If the positive results continue, the new treatment could be publicly available by the end of 2009, he predicts.
One-third of the world's population is infected with mycobacterium tuberculosis, the causative agent of TB, with around 8 million people developing the active form of the disease every year (and over 1.5 million succumbing to it). The HIV/AIDS pandemic has dramatically increased the incidence of this disease. Indeed, finding ways to trim the TB treatment time is a major public health priority of the WHO’s Stop TB partnership.
The phase II trial was conducted by the South African Medical Research Council in Durban, South Africa, in patients with newly diagnosed pulmonary tuberculosis (some with HIV co-infection, others without). It was designed to assess the anti-tuberculosis activity of the treatment in the first two months of therapy and compared with standard WHO-recommended treatment and two other similar regimens which contained either ofloxacin or moxifloxacin.