I am pleased to forward this email from MSF. This is good news for people with XDR tuberculosis. What percentage of people newly diagnosed with tuberculosis have XDR TB in Myanmar?

Remember when rifampicin was first used and people said it was too expensive for use in the developing world.

Jamie

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Good news for patients suffering from drug-resistant tuberculosis in Myanmar: MSF and the National TB Program (NTP) start using two new TB drugs for the first time in Myanmar. The two drugs bedaquiline and delamanid are the first new TB drugs to come to market in half a century and offer new hope to critically ill patients with severe forms of multi-drug resistant tuberculosis, and those resistant to even more potent second line drugs (pre-XDR and XDR-TB patients). These patients have often suffered from the disease for many years already and exhausted all other treatment options currently available to them.

“We are very excited that we can now offer the first new TB drugs in fifty years to some of our most critical patients in Myanmar. Adding bedaquiline and delamanid to our medical toolbox of potentially effective drugs allows us to create individualized regimes that offer DR-TB patients the best possible chance to survive.”

Dr. Khin Nyein Nyein, endTB implementor for MSF

For further inquiries, or interview requests for MSF medical staff, please contact Yasmin Rabiyan at Myanmar-communications@oca.msf.org for requests in English, or Aye Pyae Sone at Myanmar-communications-media@oca.msf.org for inquiries in Burmese.

Kind regards,

Yasmin Rabiyan
Communications Manager
Médecins Sans Frontières Myanmar
Mobile GSM: (+95)(0)942 027 6805

Email: myanmar-communications@oca.msf.org<mailto:myanmar-communications@oca.msf.org>
Skype: myanmar.communications.oca
Website: www.msfmyanmar.org<http://www.msfmyanmar.org<http://www.msfmyanmar.org/>>

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