The Rise of Untreatable Diseases

by admin on February 11, 2012

We track the rise of untreatable MRSA, E.Coli, Klebsiella, Gonorrhea and Tuberculosis. We examine the bigger picture of why this is happening. Read on for the latest news from multiple sources around the world.

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From a once easily treatable infection, gonorrhoea has evolved into a challenging disease, which in future may become untreatable in certain circumstances. International spread of extensively drug-resistant gonococci would have severe public health implications. It seems clear that under the current treatment pressure from extended-spectrum cephalosporins, and owing to Neisseria gonorrhoeae’s remarkable evolutionary adaptability, further rise of ceftriaxone-resistant strains around the world is inevitable. Simply increasing the doses of extended-spectrum cephalosporins will likely prove ineffective in the long run, and has been a lesson learnt for all single-agent therapies used for gonorrhoea to date. We recommend that dual therapy, especially those consisting of extended-spectrum cephalosporins and azithromycin, be adopted more widely and complemented by strengthening of antimicrobial resistance surveillance. Unless there is urgent action at international and local levels to combat the problem of N. gonorrhoeae antimicrobial resistance, we are in for gloomy times ahead in terms of gonorrhoea disease and control.

via The ticking time bomb: escalating antibiotic resistance in Neisseria gonorrhoeae is a public health disaster in waiting.

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Only 5% of MDR-TB patients adequately treated

May 18, 2012

The speed at which most countries with high burdens of multidrug resistant tuberculosis MDRTB have scaled-up their capacity to diagnose and treat individuals with these forms of TB has failed to keep pace with the problem. Limited availability of drug susceptibility testing, high costs and inefficiencies in the supply of second-line drugs, and inadequate capacity [...]

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Return of the Clap: Scientific American

May 10, 2012

Last summer a surveillance network run by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed their fears. Using a different test, the CDC demonstrated that up to 1.4 percent of 5,900 gonorrhea bacterial samples from around the U.S. had diminished susceptibility to cephalosporins, meaning they would succumb only to unusually high doses. A New England [...]

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Drug-Resistant Gonorrhea: How We Lost Track

May 10, 2012

That’s bad enough, because while we may think of gonorrhea as a minor illness long ago eclipsed in seriousness by HIV/AIDS, it remains one of the most-reported diseases in the country, with more than 600,000 known cases per year. Gonorrhea that goes untreated is personally and socially costly, causing pelvic inflammatory disease, infertility and widespread [...]

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H5N1: Kenya: Experts warn of new killer malaria strain

May 2, 2012

H5N1: Kenya: Experts warn of new killer malaria strain. For almost eight years, malaria resistance to these medicines that are derived from a compound called artemisinin, was thought to have been contained in a small area on Thailand’s border with Cambodia and Myanmar. A strain of malaria which is difficult to treat with widely used medicines [...]

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Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis that required 2 years for diagnosis

March 28, 2012

Isoniazid H or rifampicin R mono-resistant disease can be treated easily and effectively with first-line drugs, while combined H and R resistance ie, multidrug-resistant tuberculosis MDRTB requires treatment with at least four agents, including a quinolone and an injectable agent. Drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis strains are reported to be extremely difficult to cultivate invitro. The authors [...]

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Tuberculosis: the UK government must act to curb this killer disease

March 25, 2012

Figures just released show a 5% rise in the numbers of new cases of tuberculosis in the UK. TB is still the number one killer globally, increasing enormously in some parts of the world such as the former Soviet Union and South Africa. As the Observer reports, the fight against new antibiotic-resistant strains of TB [...]

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Eliminating TB and TB–HIV Co-Disease in the 21st Century: Key Perspectives, Controversies, Unresolved Issues, and Needs

March 25, 2012

However, despite being declared a global emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1995 and ensuing major initiatives during the past 15 years [4], the global burden of tuberculosis, despite declining incidence, is higher today than at any other time in history. Tuberculosis also remains one of the most important causes of death from [...]

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TB Treatment time could fall to 4 months

March 25, 2012

Despite a woeful funding gap in 2012 of US$1·7 billion, tuberculosis incidence is falling (from 9·4 million in 2009 to 8·8 million in 2010). 41 million people were treated with directly observed therapy in 1995—2009, and fewer people are now dying from the disease. Ten new or repurposed tuberculosis drugs are in phase 2—3 trials, [...]

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H5N1: WHO: Redefining drug-resistant TB

March 25, 2012

The meeting concluded that there is currently insufficient evidence to adopt new case definitions for drug-resistant TB. Drug susceptibility testing DST, which is key to defining new levels of drug resistance, lacks accuracy for several of the drugs that are used to treat multi drug-resistant MDR and extensively drug resistant XDR-TB. Read more via H5N1: [...]

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