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-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-

Up to 30,000 have new untreatable form of TB: WHO

2007-06-23

A new, untreatable form of tuberculosis is striking up to 30,000 people a year, the World Health Organization said on Friday, and warned it could spark an "apocalyptic scenario" if unchecked.

The United Nations agency appealed for $2.15 billion to combat drug-resistant TB under a program which it said could save up to 134,000 lives over two years.

Extensively drug resistant TB, virtually immune to antibiotics, has been reported in 37 countries since emerging in 2006

Extensively drug resistant TB (XDR-TB), a form virtually immune to antibiotics, has been reported in 37 countries in all regions since emerging in 2006, according to the WHO.

The recent case of an American man with XDR-TB who traveled abroad triggered an international health scare, highlighting the potential risks of rapid spread.

XDR-TB cases are particularly difficult to treat, and a patient could infect other people for years, according to Mario Raviglione, director of the WHO's Stop TB Department.

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#8 What ban, OS? I had one just a few years ago (related to rescue squad duties).

Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2007-06-23 15:30

#7 BCG vaccine isn't as helpful to us as it is in the third world. It's nowhere near perfect, and unless the rate of TB infection in a given locale is near epidemic it doesn't much reduce the rate of infection.

Posted by: Steve White 2007-06-23 14:11

#6 Thanks for the cheery assessment Moose! Oh well, nobody makes it out alive.

Posted by: Besoeker 2007-06-23 11:47

#5 The US needs to give up its outdated ban on inoculations against TB.

Posted by: OldSpook 2007-06-23 11:33

#4 Many antibiotics don't kill the bacteria and those that do (called bacteriacides) don't kill them all by a long shot.

Essentially, antibiotics tip the playing field to your immune systems advantage. So it can clear up the infection. If your immune system is screwed then antibiotics aren't going to do much good.

In the South African hospital, the staff were presumably healthy people and they succumed rapidly, which makes this form of TB a serious issue in developed countries.

Maybe Moose is right, and we have AIDS suffers to thank for this.

Posted by: phil_b 2007-06-23 09:54

#3 A lot of the breeding and spread of this disease is based on AIDS. It turns their bodies into antibiotics loaded petri dishes for TB. Without an immune system to inhibit the TB, it is just it versus the antibiotics, which do not adapt to new strains.

I suspect that TB is just the first opportunistic communicable disease to use AIDS patients as a test tube, too.

Posted by: Anonymoose 2007-06-23 07:49

#2 Gaia won't be mocked!

Posted by: gromgoru 2007-06-23 07:22

#1 I read a piece about it spreading in a South African hospital. It was killing people including staff (about 10 from memory) in less than 3 weeks from diagnosis. Scary stuff.

Posted by: phil_b 2007-06-23 05:01

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