Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis is a crisis. The World Health Organization reports that by best estimates, 480,000 people contracted multidrug-resistant TB in 2014. Without treatment, MDR-TB is a debilitating, lethal disease. It spreads through the air, meaning that a single instance of MDR-TB can put many people at risk of infection. And yet three-quarters of people with MDR-TB never even receive a diagnosis. Of the few people with MDR-TB who begin treatment, only half are treated successfully.
MDR-TB exists in virtually all countries. What’s more, since it was first described in the medical literature just a decade ago, at least 100 countries have reported cases of extensively drug-resistant TB — an advanced form resistant to medicines reserved solely for treating drug-resistant strains. In the past few years, countries have begun reporting cases of people sick with TB that is resistant to all available medicines.
MDR-TB is one of the most complex illnesses to treat, and one of the most difficult treatments to endure.
About the author
José Luis Castro
José Luis Castro is president and CEO at Vital Strategies, where he has led a rapid expansion of its portfolio and worked with governments to tackle the world’s leading killers, primarily in low- and middle-income countries. The organization now reaches into 73 countries and has touched the lives of more than 2 billion people.
