World Without TB (WWTB) is a CHARITY registered with the United Kingdom Charities Commission, REGISTRATION Number 1118938.

Registered office: Crouch Chapman, 62 Wilson Street, London EC2A 2BU

Registration N^o 6125301

Office Bearers:

• Peter Smith FCA– Trustee Secretary & Treasurer
• John Fraser – Trustee
• Jane Marshall BSc (Hons)– Trustee
• Rafiq Rattansi – Trustee
• Amina Jindani MD, FRCP – Scientific Advisor
• Angela Miller MSc, PhD – Technical Advisor

WHAT IS OUR MISSION?

Our mission is the global eradication of tuberculosis through the identification of safe and effective treatment regimens of very short durations.

This will be achieved through :

• Clinical trials

  We plan to conduct a series of clinical trials, with the drugs currently used in the treatment of tuberculosis, the objectives of which will be to significantly reduce the treatment duration from the current six months. Each trial will conform to the Guidelines on Good Clinical Practice defined by the International Conference on Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for Registration of Pharmaceuticals for Human Use (ICH GCP Guidelines),

• Capacity strengthening

  Organisations involved in tuberculosis control, such as treatment centres of the National Tuberculosis Control Programmes and Hospitals and University Research Groups will be assessed for their capacity to participate in the trials and any weaknesses identified will be strengthened in order to be able improve their capacity to participate in the trials.

• Equipment supply

  Where necessary, laboratory and office equipment will be supplied to improve capacity

• Training

  Staff at participating centres will have the opportunity to be trained in the use of new equipment as well as software for data entry and data management.

• Workshops

  Group training on issues such as ICH GCP Guidelines, trial design, protocol preparation and all aspects of trial conduct will be carried out through regular workshops and the provision of written materials.

• Networking

  Regional, continental and international networks will be encouraged through multisite participation in trials and international meetings.

About us

World Without TB (WWTB), a registered charity in the U.K., and seeking registration in France and Canada on a not-for-profit basis in order to maximise the resources available to assist other similar organisations, devoted to the global eradication of tuberculosis. WWTB is seeking to achieve this by testing different combinations of drugs that are currently in use. We believe that by increasing the dose of some of these drugs, treatment duration can be reduced to 4, and even 3 months within the next 5 to 10 years. This will be achieved by carrying out small scale clinical trials using drugs currently given for the treatment of the disease.

If successful the outcomes will be :

1. High cure rates
2. Reduced treatment duration
3. Improved compliance
4. Reduced toxicity
5. Reduced chances of unfavourable interactions with antiretroviral treatment for concomitant HIV/AIDS
6. Reduced burden of administration on the National Tuberculosis Control Programmes of high burden countries.

There are two groups of drugs currently in use which could be explored to achieve this treatment reduction. These are the rifamycins and the quinolones. There is already a small body of evidence showing that the dose of the rifamycins can be safely increased with a concurrent improvement in their ability to cure active tuberculosis. If these findings could be confirmed in further trials, it could well lead to a reduction in treatment of 2, or even 3, months

Recently, there have been trials showing that the quinolones, which have previously been given only to patients with disease resistant to first line drugs, can reduce treatment durations in newly diagnosed cases of tuberculosis. In addition experiments recently carried out at the Johns Hopkins University have shown that a combination of the rifamycins and quinolones achieved a very rapid sterilisation of the disease in mice.

WWTB will use all the experimental knowledge available to define treatment schemes which will further reduce the duration of treatment.