Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) is on the rise, and is difficult to treat and according to recent National Drug Resistance Survey, 28 percent had resistance for any drug.

The medical experts said that in a major push to the treatment, Drug susceptibility test (DST) guided treatment is the policy now. Dr. Bhanuo Awasthi Principal Tanda Medical College today told UNI that Bedaquiline is the first anti-TB drug to be rolled out in the last 40 years and is a ray of hope for ‘extremely drug resistant’ cases of TB. Bedaquiline represent a new hope for patients sick with the most resistant forms of TB, for whom most existing drugs do not work.

Approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 2012, by 2015 bedaquiline had received approval for use in India and in February 2016 it was announced that bedaquiline is to be made available in India. Tanda Medical College has become the leading institute in Himachal for access to the miracle drug bedaqulinine – with 6 patients started on treatment: 2 are from Kangra, 3 from Mandi, and 1 from Una.

Government spends Rs 21 lakhs on each patient. Dr. Bhanuo Awasthi said that Bedaquiline is a promising new TB drug but it must be carefully introduced and monitored. Special ECG machine which calculate the QT interval has been provided to the institute
under TB programme for this purpose, he disclosed.

He said that Bedaquiline works by blocking an enzyme inside the Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria called ATP synthase. He said that this enzyme is used by the bacteria to generate energy and without the ability to generate energy, the TB bacteria die and the patient’s condition can start to improve.