Tuberculosis — Drugs in the 2016 40 Wall Street, New York, New York 10005, USA

CORRESPONDENCE LINK TO ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Barbara E. Laughon is with the STOP TB Partnership’s Working Group on New TB Drugs, 24th Floor, Tuberculosis — drugs in the 2016 40 Wall Street, New York, New York 10005, USA. Carol A. Nacy is at Sequella, Inc., Suite 200, 9610 Medical Center Drive, Rockville, development pipeline Maryland 20850, USA. Correspondence to B.E.L. Barbara E. Laughon and Carol A. Nacy [email protected] Article number: 17015 doi:10.1038/nrdp.2017.15 In their recent Primer article (Tuberculosis. benzothiazinone PBTZ‑169 (REF. 3) and has Published online 9 Mar 2017 Nat. Rev. Dis. Primers 2, 16076 (2016))1, initiated a phase II early bactericidal activ‑ 1. Pai, M. et al. Tuberculosis. Nat. Rev. Dis. Primers 2, Madhukar Pai and colleagues give an impor‑ ity study in Russia. Otsuka Pharmaceutical 16076 (2016). tant and comprehensive update on the announced that its novel carbostyril com‑ 2. Kling, A. et al. Antibiotics. Targeting DnaN for tuberculosis therapy using novel griselimycins. advances made in epidemiology, diagnosis, pound OPC‑167832 has entered phase I Science 348, 1106–1112 (2015). prevention and treatment for combatting clinical safety testing4. Sequella, Inc. reports 3. Makarov, V. & Cole, S. First clinical trial with the novel drug candidate PBTZ169: expected results and the global tuberculosis (TB) epidemic. The completion of a phase II/III trial of SQ109 surprises [abstract 56]. Tuberculosis2016.org Primer included the global TB drug pipe‑ by their partner Infectex in Russia5,6 and http://www.tuberculosis2016.org/images/Public/ Maquette-27sep2016.pdf (2016). line (Figure 5) that represented the status of maintains SQ109 as an active candidate in 4. [No authors listed.] New TB compound to the field as of April 2016. However, several the phase II stage in the United States5,7,8. be developed for Pan‑TB regimen. StopTB http://www.stoptb.org/news/frompartners/2016/ important new developments were reported A new oxazolidinone, LCB01‑0371, is being fp16_094.asp (2016). at two major scientific conferences later developed by LegoChem Biosciences in 5. Phipps, A. Sutezolid and SQ‑109 update. Talk presented at the Clinical Path to TB Drug 9 in 2016: the EMBO Conference Tuberculosis South Korea and is in phase II testing . Regimens (CPTR) Workshop, May 2016 https:// 2016 in Paris, France, 19–23 September 2016 Despite these advances, many more TB www.youtube.com/watch?v=94l6qForpHI& feature=youtu.be (2016). (http://www.tuberculosis2016.org/), and drug candidates are needed to sustain an 6. Skornyakov, S. N. et al. Effectiveness and safety the 47th Union World Congress on Lung effective and productive drug pipeline. Given of a chemotherapy regimen that includes SQ109 in pulmonary tuberculosis patients with MDR‑TB. Health and associated meetings in Liverpool, the known attrition rate of new chemical enti‑ Talk presented at the National Scientific and Practical UK, 26–29 October 2016 (http://liverpool. ties, a robust number of candidates will be Conference of Phthisiologists, Moscow http://roftb.ru/ conf/russian (2016). worldlunghealth.org/). We believe that needed to achieve the goals of shortening cur‑ 7. Boeree, M. J. et al. High-dose rifampicin, moxifloxacin, updates to the 2016 status of the TB drug rent treatment and effectively dealing with the and SQ109 for treating tuberculosis: a multi-arm, multi-stage randomized controlled trial. Lancet Infect. pipeline would be of interest to readers of increasing level of drug resistance worldwide. Dis. 17, 39–49 (2016). the journal. As referenced in the Primer, the STOP 8. Ruslami, R. & Menzies, D. Finding the right dose of rifampicin, and the right dose of optimism. Among these updates is the novel cyclo‑ TB Partnership’s Working Group on New Lancet Infect. Dis. 17, 2–3 (2016). peptide SATB‑082, a preclinical development Drugs maintains an active inventory of new 9. US National Library of Medicine. ClinicalTrials.gov https://clinicaltrials.gov/show/NCT02836483 (2016). candidate by Sanofi and the TB Alliance2; molecular entities in development, as well as the macrolide SEQ‑9 has been depriori a listing of ongoing clinical trials of new drug Competing interests C.A.N. is the Founder and CEO of Sequella, Inc., which is the tized by the same group. Nearmedic Plus regimens for the treatment of TB. The website commercial developer of sutezolid and SQ109. B.E.L. announced results from phase I testing of the is www.newtbdrugs.org/. declares no competing interests.