Call to step up research for TB vaccine
|Published
Gwen Ramokgopa Picture: Timothy Bernard Gwen Ramokgopa Picture: Timothy Bernard
Durban - An effective vaccine to treat tuberculosis, which is regarded as the chief cause of death in patients living with HIV, is needed in the country.
This was the call made by the Deputy Minister of Health, Dr Gwen Ramokgopa, during a plenary session at the 6th SA Aids Conference at Durban’s International Convention Centre which ended on Friday.
Ramokgopa said models needed to be developed if they were to have an impact in the treatment of TB.
Dr William Bishai, of the Aarum Institute, a non-profit organisation, said a new TB drug, Bedaquiline, which had been approved in the US, would be introduced in South Africa soon.
Bishai said currently just to treat a TB-infected in-patient, they needed half a kilogram of tablets, which he said was a lot of medication.
“Why can’t we come up with short-course treatment for TB? We have a problem killing the persistence of the virus. If we want to treat multidrug-resistant TB in KZN, we will need at least two new drugs,” he said.
Bishai said that with Bedaquiline being a new drug, they still were not quite sure how to use it and would need more input to ensure they got it right.
“This (Bedaquiline) is exciting news. It’s a promising drug for MDR TB,” he said.
Bishai said the reason they were not getting treatment for TB right was because guidelines did not focus on important things, like the correct dosage. “We must calculate doses correctly,” he said.
Professor Willem Hanekom, of the South African Tuberculosis Vaccine Initiative at the University of Cape Town, said: “We need to integrate our work. We must invest more in getting a vaccine for TB.” - Daily News