Shortening Treatment for Tuberculosis — Back to Basics

Abstract

With approximately 8 million incident cases and 1.3 million deaths each year, increasing drug resistance, and exacerbating coexisting conditions such as the human immunodeficiency virus–acquired immunodeficiency syndrome and diabetes, tuberculosis continues to pose a massive threat to global health. In the absence of a vaccine to provide long-term protection, control of drug-susceptible tuberculosis is largely dependent on a standard 6-month chemotherapy regimen that has been in use for more than three decades. Any experimental therapy designed to modify this short-course regimen — which comprises a 2-month intensive phase with four drugs (rifampin, isoniazid, pyrazinamide, and ethambutol) followed by a 4-month . . .