Promising Drug Candidates in Advanced Clinical Trials

Abstract

To overcome the problems with available treatments, new drugs to treat TB are urgently required, specifically more potent therapies, with fewer side effects, to be used in shorter treatment regimens and to be employed to treat MDR TB and latent disease. Unfortunately, after the introduction of rifampin in the market (1966-1970), no new classes of anti-TB drugs have been developed in the last forty-three year, excepted by rifapentine, a very close analog of rifampin, which was introduced by the FDA in 1998 and more recently bedaquiline, a diarylquinoline approved by FDA for multidrugresistant tuberculosis in December 2012. In this context, different new initiatives have been created to obtain promising drug candidates. Considering that, this chapter will be highlights promising drugs in advanced clinical trials that may soon be introduced onto the market.

Keywords: Tuberculosis, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, drugs, drug development, treatment, clinical trials, multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR TB), extensivedrug- resistant tuberculosis (XDR TB), AIDS, target, mechanism of action, synthesis.