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A new and crucial collaboration between Global Alliance for TB Drug Development (TB Alliance) and Tibotec Inc. was announced at the Pacific Health Summit, in response to the urgent need to accelerate the discovery and development new drugs to combat tuberculosis (TB).

The two organizations will share their knowledge and resources in the development of TMC207, which could become the first drug for tuberculosis with a new mechanism of action in 40 years. Provisional data from a Phase II study of TMC207 in progress were published recently in The New England Journal of Medicine. In placebo-controlled study of 47 patients with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB for short), it was noted that 48 percent of patients who received TMC207 in combination with standard treatment were negative sputum cultures after eight weeks compared with 9 percent of those receiving a placebo and standard treatment.

The partnership, aimed at improving the treatment of one of the oldest diseases and increased mortality of the world, will maximize the expertise and resources of public and private sectors. It urgently needs to increase efforts and resources to develop new and better drugs for tuberculosis. Among infectious diseases, tuberculosis is the second most common cause of deaths worldwide in adultosi. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that approximately one third of the world population is infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tb), the bacillus that causes TBii and the disease is responsible for nearly 5,000 deaths per day throughout the mundoiii. MDR-TB, which is characterized by resistance to at least two of the most effective in the scheme of the four standard drugs currently on the drug-sensitive tuberculosis, is particularly worrying in view of the rapidly growing number of cases worldwide and the difficulties of their treatment. In 2007, it is estimated that 510,000 MDR-incidenciasv and TBViv caused 130,000 deaths. The Pacific Health Summit this year focuses on MDR-TB due to the growing threat that this disease represents to public health.