TB continues to be No. 1 killer among infectious diseases despite rampant use of antibiotics: Expert
Trivandrum / July 11, 2024
Thiruvananthapuram, July 11: Despite the clinical use of over 20 antibiotics and BCG, a century-old vaccine, tuberculosis has remained as the number one killer among all infectious diseases, accounting for nearly 1.5 million deaths yearly, a leading microbiologist said here today.
Dr Vinay Nandicoori, Director, CSIR-CCMB, Hyderabad, however, said recent findings in labs on mycobacterial cell division held out hopes of dealing with the increasingly drug-resistant strains of the disease in a more effective manner.
He was delivering a talk on the topic “Delineating Molecular Mechanisms that drive the survival of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis (Mtb)” at Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology(RGCB) here.
RGCB Director Prof Chandrabhas Narayana welcomed the gathering.
Dr Nandicoori, a J C Bose Fellow, said TB has been among the oldest diseases in the world with its strains found in mummies in Egypt. The gradual rise in the emergence of increasingly drug-resistant strains and HIV-TB co-infection highlights the urgency to identify newer attractive drugs.
“India, unfortunately, has the highest burden of TB in the world, and it is our problem. Many people do not know that TB is not limited to lungs. It can be in eyes, in reproductive organs, in liver, stomach, and bones. And the worst part of it is diagnosis is even more difficult,” he said.
“It is not an easy pathogen to deal with. And if you end up using getting multi drug resistant (MDR) bacteria, that would be a serious issue if it comes to treatment. The reason is for anybody with a TB disease, the treatment time is four to six months, depending on the therapy. And if you end up getting MDR TB, it takes about nine months to a year, sometimes even longer,” he noted.
Dr Nandicoori said in every infectious disease, such as anthrax, septicemia, tuberculosis and cholera, a basic postulate is that the organism should be present in every case of the disease. Also, it can be cultured outside, while inoculation of this culture should cause the disease in an animal, and organism should be found after the infection.
Dr Nandicoori said it is important to continue with research on TB as in case of SARS and COVID, which have come to stay. COVID alone has killed around 10 million people, but TB kills around 1.5 million people every year. “For SARS and COVID, one can develop a vaccine, but for TB, it is not an easy one,” he noted.
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