CANCUN, Mexico, Dec 3 (Reuters) - Health experts on Thursday called for more research funding to develop better diagnostic tests, vaccines and drugs for tuberculosis, which killed 1.8 million people around the world last year.
While diseases like AIDS and malaria can be diagnosed in minutes by applying a drop of blood to a rapid test kit, confirming active tuberculosis, or TB, is a laborious procedure.
It requires a patient to cough up sputum, which is smeared on a slide, stained and examined under a microscope.
And the 100-year-old test misses up to 70 percent of otherwise positive cases in some places, experts say.
In Africa, where the scourge of TB is most keenly felt, many people delay follow-up testing because of cost.
"A lot of people die before a TB diagnosis is even made," Dr Jeremiah Chakaya of the Kenya Medical Research Institute told reporters at an international conference on lung health in Cancun, Mexico.
Monday, December 7, 2009
More funds needed for TB tests, drugs, vaccines
via reuters.com
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment