Older antibiotic shows success in treating drug-resistant TB in small study

"An antibiotic used to treat severe bacterial infections showed promise at treating a highly drug-resistant and deadly form of tuberculosis [TB]," according to a study conducted by U.S. government and South Korean researchers and published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday, Reuters reports (Steenhuysen, 10/17). The "small study offers a bit of cautious optimism about the prospects for treatment of tuberculosis, ... showing that adding a 12-year-old antibiotic called linezolid, brand name Zyvox, to existing treatments cured nearly 90 percent of patients with a form of tuberculosis resistant to both first- and second-line antibiotics," NPR's "Shots" blog writes (Knox, 10/18). "However, most of the patients [in the study] -- 82 percent -- experienced side effects while on the treatment, which tempered the findings, the team reported," Reuters notes. "Researchers are desperately looking for new treatments for drug-resistant forms of TB, which threatens to derail progress in the global fight to eradicate the disease," according to the news agency (10/17).