Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis (TB), a disease caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), is a global health emergency.

Most TB is curable if appropriately diagnosed and treated. However, multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) is resistant to rifampicin and isoniazid, two key antibiotics in TB treatment regimens, and is therefore much harder to treat.

Diagnosing MDR-TB is a challenge for resource-limited settings, including in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where there is an extremely high burden of TB, but vital information on drug resistance is lacking.

This research is a collaboration between investigators at Catholic University of Bukavu and Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine as well as UK Health Security Agency.

Dr Esto Bahizire and Dr Naomi Walker will investigate MDR-TB in Eastern DRC by studying mycobacterial culture and whole genome sequencing (WGS) of isolates from patients with pulmonary TB in South Kivu province. Their aim is to unravel the genetics of MDR-TB and associate these with patient outcomes.

This project has been funded by the 2022 Dorothy Temple Cross International Collaboration Grant.