Yesterday an email arrived in my inbox informing me that recent research has shown that two commonly used antihypertensive agents are equally good at keeping people's blood pressure down. Last week I spent some time at a conference in Cape Town where the growing problem of tuberculosis (TB), and particularly drug-resistant TB, was discussed. The public-private partnerships that are trying to tackle this devastating disease announced that there are two new drugs in the pipeline to treat TB and that a new vaccine is a definite possibility. Now TB has been around for years but the drugs used to treat it today were developed over 40 years ago and, until recently, there has been no attempt to develop new drugs. Contrast hypertension. Every drug company in the world sells several different antihypertensive agents - most of which are equally effective and can be used equally well by most people. Someone dies of TB every 20 seconds somewhere in the world. I think it would be fair to say that TB is a forgotten disease - but not forgotten by the people who suffer its ravages and who cannot afford to pay for expensive medication themselves. We neglect them at our peril.
Bridget Farham, https://www.bizcommunity.com