Little Progress Made Against Tuberculosis

Disease challenges drug developers

January 28, 2011

The last TB drug innovation with a completely new mechanism, was discovered almost a half-century ago.

Nearly 10 million new cases of tuberculosis are expected this year. The disease is more prevalent than ever, and the world's drug researchers don't seem to be making much headway.

Tuberculosis is a stubborn disease to treat. The current regimen for standard cases involves four different medicines taken over six months. More powerful medicines are needed for drug-resistant strains, and some varieties are hard to treat with any drugs.

Most recent tuberculosis drugs are variations on previous medicines. Anil Koul, a researcher with drug maker Johnson & Johnson, notes that the last TB drug with a completely new mechanism, rifampicin, was discovered almost a half-century ago. There are now just a handful of potential TB drugs in development, and some are variations of existing drugs, or scaffolds.

"With just nine drugs in the pipeline, with lots of resistance issues - some of these drugs being re-engineered scaffolds and with lots of post-approval failures in the drug industry, I think lots of work still needs to be done," he says.

Koul attributes the relatively small number of possible new tuberculosis drugs to complacency and a sense that progress was being made with existing drugs.