Mycobacterium Tuberculosis is spread via air droplets which are breathed into the lungs, where the disease can lay dormant or spread.
Multi-drug resistant tuberculosis is on the rise globally– and its a HUGE problem! Multi-drug resistant TB is caused by a resistance to the two most commonly used front line defense against the bacteria. It is estimated that 10.0 million people were infected with tuberculosis with 1.6 million of them dying from the disease with 87% of those affected being from developing countries. Currently those being treated with resistant TB endure a lengthy (can last up to two years), costly treatment often with toxic side effects and a success rate of only 60%. Often times in developing countries, multi-drug resistant TB is either misdiagnosed or went undetected due to inaccurate tests, which ultimately leads to higher mortality rates.
In a study conducted by researchers from the Institute of Social and Preventative Medicine (ISPM), 634 patients were evaluated from different developing countries including Côte d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Thialand, Peru, South Africa and Nigeria. It was found that only 7% of the TB cases were monoresistant, 26% were multiresistant,and 5% were resistant against an extensive amount of antibiotics. A whopping 60% of the TB cases in patients that resistance was inaccurately not found died from insufficient treatment. After these findings, researchers recommend investigating the sequencing of the bacteria’s entire DNA in each individual case of TB; however, there is a lot of work that needs to be done in order to make these test accessible in developing countries.
In a study led by Queen Mary of London, Vitamin D was found to speed up the clearance of TB in a random sampling of 1,850 patients receiving antibiotic treatment. Lead researcher Professor Adrian Martineu investigated adding vitamin D in addition to the antibiotic treatment in hopes to boost the immune system in order to clear the bacteria without soling relying on the antibiotics that had become resistant. This study was a novel approach to combating tuberculosis since a lot of focus has been on investigating new antibiotics that the bacteria is not resistant to. The addition of vitamin D added no adverse side effects and opened the door to “host-directed” therapies,” which are therapies that boost the immune system. Although the study was not conducted on a large enough population to justify clinical recommendation, it opened the door for further investigation and a rationale to conduct further clinical trials.
MCRO 251 