{"id":143719,"date":"2018-01-04T03:50:23","date_gmt":"2018-01-04T08:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=143719"},"modified":"2018-01-04T03:50:23","modified_gmt":"2018-01-04T08:50:23","slug":"tuberculosis-drugs-work-better-with-vitamin-c-us-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/01\/04\/tuberculosis-drugs-work-better-with-vitamin-c-us-study\/","title":{"rendered":"Tuberculosis drugs work better with vitamin C: US study"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Scanning<\/a>
Scanning electron micrograph of M. tuberculosis (Photo By Photo Credit: Janice CarrContent Providers(s): CDC\/ Dr. Ray Butler; Janice Carr, Public Domain<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WASHINGTON<\/strong>\u00a0— Tuberculosis patients may have a quicker way to recover.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A new study on mice and tissue cultures suggested that giving vitamin C with tuberculosis drugs could reduce the unusually long time it took these drugs to eradicate this pathogen.<\/p>\n

The study was published Wednesday in the US journal of Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.<\/p>\n

In the study, investigators treated Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb)-infected mice with anti-tuberculosis drugs and vitamin C together and separately.<\/p>\n

Vitamin C had no activity by itself, but in two independent experiments, the combination of vitamin C with the first-line TB drugs, isoniazid and rifampicin, reduced the organ burdens faster than the two drugs without vitamin C, it showed.<\/p>\n

Experiments in infected tissue cultures demonstrated similar results, shortening the time to sterilization of the tissue culture by seven days.<\/p>\n

“Our study shows that the addition of vitamin C to TB drug treatment potentiates the killing of Mtb and could shorten TB chemotherapy,” said principal investigator William R. Jacobs at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Albert Einstein College of Medicine.<\/p>\n

Drug-susceptible tuberculosis usually takes six months for treatment. Such long-term treatment is needed because a subpopulation of Mtb cells can form dormant cells that are virtually impervious to antimicrobials.<\/p>\n

It risks resulting in “mismanagement, potentially leading to the emergence and spread of drug-resistant TB,” said Jacobs.<\/p>\n

“In our new paper, we postulate that vitamin C is stimulating respiration of the Mtb cells in mice, thus enabling the action of isoniazid and rifampicin.”<\/p>\n

Tuberculosis is a major worldwide public health problem, infecting the lungs and other organ systems. In 2016, the disease sickened more than 10 million people worldwide, and killed 1.7 million.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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