More drugs, vaccines needed for M/XDR-TB

Health ministers from countries with the greatest burdens of multiple or extreme drug-resistant tuberculosis (M/XDR-TB) have agreed a program to  halt and reverse the global disease epidemic. The leaders met in  Beijing, China, at a three-day event hosted by the World Health  Organization's Director General Margaret Chan and the co-chairman of the  Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Microsoft founder Bill Gates. China's  Vice Premier Li Keqiang and representatives of 27 countries with high  burdens of TB were also present.

A package of measures was called for, including: universal access to  M/XDR-TB diagnosis and treatment by 2015; removal of financial barriers  to TB care; sufficient trained and deployed staff; improved laboratory  systems; the development of airborne infection-control policies; a  sufficient supply of high-quality anti-TB drugs; and mechanisms to  ensure availability of TB medicines is regulated.

Mr Gates urged all countries to invest in innovative methods to fight  TB. He said: "every country should feel the urgency, whether it is  suffering from TB or not. Every country is capable of innovation,  whether it has a high-tech economy or not. And every country can adapt  its systems to use the best innovations of others."