The problems of multidrug-resistant (MDR) tuberculosis (TB), extensively drug-resistant (XDR) TB, and even ‘‘totally drug-resistant’’ TB (a term that is still debated), have exposed two important clinical issues [1, 2]. The first issue involves figuring out a way to prevent these difficult-to-treat diseases. The second issue is treating patients with drug-resistant TB [3]. In the meantime even ...

BACKGROUND The success of the current treatment regimen for multidrug-resistant (MDR) tuberculosis is poor partly owing to a high default rate. Many studies have explored predictors of poor outcomes, but very few have assessed the effects of treatment interruptions on treatment outcomes for MDR tuberculosis. METHODS We conducted a retrospective analysis among patients with MDR tuberculosis en...

The global emergence of multidrugresistant (MDR) tuberculosis (TB) and extensively drug-resistant (XDR)-TB threatens to derail the efforts of TB control programmes worldwide. From 2000 to 2010, 161 pulmonary MDR-TB cases (including six XDR-TB cases) were reported in Singapore, and of these, 80% occurred among the foreign-born, with an increasing trend seen after 2004. Among new pulmonary TB cas...

Multidrug-resistant and extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (TB) are associated with worse treatment outcomes for patients, including higher mortality, than for drug-sensitive tuberculosis. Delamanid (OPC-67683) is a novel anti-TB medication with demonstrated activity against multidrug-resistant disease. Patients who participated in the previously reported randomised, placebo-controlled tri...

www.thelancet.com/lancetgh Vol 3 February 2015 e83 transmission of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, mainly because we were modelling a setting with low multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. However, our approach could be used in contexts with a higher prevalence of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis than Tanzania because both the eff ect on the level of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis diagnosed and...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE Tuberculosis is the commonest opportunistic disease in persons infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Emergence of drug resistant isolates of M. tuberculosis highlights the need for continuous monitoring of drug resistance to antituberculosis drugs. Considering the reported high prevalence of drug resistance in HIV infected tuberculosis patients, we studied the...

Pyrazinamide (PZA) is a first-line antitubercular drug known for its activity against persistent Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacilli. We set out to systematically determine the PZA susceptibility profiles and mutations in the pyrazinamidase (pncA) gene of a collection of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) clinical isolates and PZA-resistant (PZA(r)) spontaneous mutants. The frequency of a...

Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) presents an increasing threat to global tuberculosis control. Many crucial management issues in MDR-TB treatment remain unanswered. We reviewed the existing scientific research on MDR-TB treatment, which consists entirely of retrospective cohort studies. Although direct comparisons of these studies are impossible, some insights can be gained: MDR-TB can...

Since 2008, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control has been collecting data from the European Union (EU) and European Economic Area (EEA) on resistance to first- and second-line drugs against tuberculosis (TB). In 2008, the proportion of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR TB) was 6.0% of the total case load for 25 countries reporting data. Extensively drug-resistant (XDR TB) ...

Framework Action Plan to fight tuberculosis in the European Union 2 PREFACE The European Union's (EU) Health Commissioner, Markos Kyprianou, called on the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) in March 2007 to develop a proposal for an action plan to fight tuberculosis (TB) in the EU 1. This initiative reflects the priority given to TB in the EU where this disease is a conti...