Growers: Hard to kill
Last year, tuberculosis (TB), caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) killed 1.5 million people, overtaking HIV/ AIDS – this reflects massive advances in treatment of HIV, which haven’t been matched in the treatment of TB. Although almost all cases of TB are curable, the treatment is extremely long, and no progress has been made in shortening treatment in 40 years, since the introduction of the drug rifampicin: which reduced the regimen duration from 18 to 6 months.
