CDC Foundation - Tuberculosis: A Resistant Threat


	Although treatable and curable, TB remains one of the biggest killers worldwide, claiming 2 million lives annually. While TB infection rates are at their lowest ever in the U.S., around the globe, one-third of the world’s population is infected with TB. Learn more about TB and how the CDC Foundation supports CDC’s global efforts to control it.

Tuberculosis: A Resistant Threat

Although treatable and curable, tuberculosis (TB) remains one of the biggest killers worldwide, claiming 2 million lives annually. While tuberculosis infection rates are at their lowest ever in the U.S., around the globe, one-third of the world’s population is infected with TB. Learn more about TB and how the CDC Foundation supports CDC’s global efforts to control it.

The Spread of TB

TB is spread through the air from one person to another. When a person with active TB disease of the lungs or throat coughs or sneezes, bacteria are expelled into the air. People nearby may breathe in these bacteria and become infected.

To become infected, a person usually has to spend a relatively long time in a closed environment in close proximity to a person with active TB. Therefore, those most at risk of exposure are family, friends or co-workers.

Recent events have raised concern about the potential of TB to spread through air travel. Research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggests that the risk of TB transmission on an airplane does not appear to be greater than in any other enclosed space. However, when comparing shorter domestic flights with longer international flights, research does suggest that the risk of TB transmission is greater on long flights of eight or more hours. To protect travelers, CDC and the World Health Organization (WHO) recommend that people with infectious TB travel by private transportation (i.e. not by commercial airplanes or other commercial carriers), if travel is required.

Drug-resistant TB

A major concern of the public health community is the emergence of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDRTB) caused by strains of bacteria that standard drug treatments cannot cure.

Resistant TB strains develop when anti-TB drugs are misused or mismanaged, such as when patients stop taking their medication too soon because they start to feel better, when doctors prescribe the wrong treatment, or when the supply of high-quality anti-TB drugs is unreliable. When individuals develop drug-resistant TB, the people they infect will have the same drug-resistant strain. Drug-resistant TB cases have been reported in countries around the world, but are particularly a problem in resource-poor countries without strong public health or healthcare systems.

Treating drug-resistant TB requires a combination of what are called “second-line” and “third-line” drugs - those used when the “first-line,” or standard, treatment fails. These drugs are very expensive and often need to be administered for longer periods of time, from 18 to 36 months. And they often have more adverse side effects.

Extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDRTB) is a relatively rare type of MDRTB that is resistant to almost all anti-TB drugs. People infected with XDRTB are left with treatment options that are much less effective, and they often experience less favorable treatment outcomes.

Helping CDC Do More, Faster

CDC collaborates with other federal agencies and international partners to raise awareness and enhance strategies for TB prevention worldwide. CDC’s anti-TB activities include:

Assembling outbreak response teams
Improving access to TB drugs
Developing international TB testing standards
Supporting TB communication and education efforts
Building capacity of healthcare providers

The CDC Foundation supports CDC’s global efforts to control TB through several innovative partnerships.

A partnership involving the CDC Foundation, Harvard University and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation enables CDC experts to provide technical assistance ( i.e. help with research, infection control, community outreach, training and technology) to local health officials working in the shantytowns of northern Lima, Peru. Ultimately, the goal of the project is to develop a model for MDRTB surveillance and control programs that can be replicated in other resource-poor countries.
A CDC Foundation partnership with Eli Lilly and Company provides funds for CDC experts to help strengthen MDRTB monitoring and surveillance in Russia.
A partnership with the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics is helping identify new methods for laboratories to quickly detect MDRTB strains and test their susceptibility to various anti-TB drugs.
A new CDC Foundation partnership with Sanofi-Aventis will help CDC evaluate new anti-TB drugs. Research indicates that drug treatments that work better and are easier for patients to take would be important weapons in the global fight against TB. They could potentially improve patient compliance and decrease the likely of the development of more drug-resistant TB strains.

How You Can Help

TB is just one example of an infectious disease that can easily travel around the world at the speed of commercial air travel. Dedicated experts at CDC work to protect all of us from these infectious threats, helping to identify the best treatment and prevention strategies and participating in international collaborations to stop the spread of killer diseases. But they can’t do it alone. Innovative partnerships with businesses and foundations and support from individuals like you help arm CDC experts with the resources they need to get the job done.

Learn more about how the CDC Foundation helps CDC do more, faster, to fight TB and other global threats to health and safety â€¦ and how you can help.

Related Information:

Controlling MDRTB in Peru- FrontLine Newsletter Fall 2001