Justified focus on Ebola should not compromise efforts against other diseases that kill more people

This blog originally appeared on Global Health TV on Sept. 23, 2014.

Ebola is a terrible disease that has already infected 5,335 people and killed 2,630 as of Sept. 14, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), and threatens to kill many more thousands before its rampage of destruction is slowed down or stopped. WHO designated it as a global emergency on Aug. 8.

“This Ebola epidemic is the largest and most severe and most complex we have ever seen in the nearly 40-year history of this disease,” said Margaret Chan, director-general of the WHO. “This is a global threat that requires global coordination to get it done. We can and we will bring the Ebola epidemic under control.”

Yet another of its terrible legacies may be that it will distract attention and resources from other diseases that are killing far more people.

Tuberculosis finally catching up to 21st century

This was originally published on Global Health TV on March 24, 2014.

Tuberculosis (TB) treatment, which had been lost in a time warp for a century, seems to be finally joining the 21^st century.

Until recently, there were no new TB drugs on the market in half a century, little progress in the treatment of multidrug-resistant (MDR) and extensively drug-resistant (XDR) forms of TB and virtually nothing new on pediatric TB, according to David Greeley, the president and CEO of Accordia Global Health Foundation, who previously worked for the TB Alliance. The current vaccine, developed more than a century ago, is largely ineffective, he said. TB diagnostics were ancient, too, as is TB itself, which has been around since 4,000 B.C. Current treatment was cheap and sometimes effective but took a long time and misses a lot of people  (like children, and MDR and XDR patients).

Which is why the Stop TB Partnership has made those missing people the theme of this year’s World TB Day on March 24: “Reach the 3 Million.” That’s the number of TB patients the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates are “missed” by public health systems out of the 8.6 million who fall ill of TB each year.  Many of those 3 million live in the world’s poorest, most vulnerable communities and include groups such as migrants, miners, drug users and sex workers. Over 95% of TB deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries. India and China are the countries with the most TB patients.