Newsweek published an Web Exclusive interview yesterday on the emergence of XDR-TB as a global public health threat.  Prompted by James Nachtwey’s photos and XDRTB.org, Newsweek’s Anne Underwood spoke with Dr. Mario Raviglione, director of the World Health Organization’s Stop TB Department, and Anna Cataldi, world ambassador for WHO’s Stop TB Partnership.

While the interview covers many important issues, I found the following exchange of particular interest:

Does the existence of XDR mean we’ve failed at fighting TB?

Raviglione: It’s a sign that things have gone wrong in many places, due to mismanagement of cases, careless prescriptions of drugs, incorrect regimens and the lack of support and follow-up with patients. Together, these problems have created MDR- and XDR-TB. If we do not turn the tide by establishing good, basic TB control and care practices, it will lead to an increase in XDR-TB.

Cataldi: Drug companies are not very interested in TB, because the drugs are so cheap. By contrast, antiretroviral cocktails for HIV are a gigantic business. The drugs we use for TB now are 50 years old. Further dissemination of XDR-TB may stop all progress we’ve made in recent years in control [of normal TB].

It is staggering to think that a disease which continues to infect millions worldwide can be so forgotten and, in the broader picture, ignored. Sharing the story of XDR-TB feels even more crucial.

Read the whole interview here.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 30th, 2008 at 10:46 am and is filed under TEDPrize Updates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.