Tuberculosis Vaccines and Novel Drug Development

Dear Colleagues,

Tuberculosis (TB) continues to be a major global health burden and kills over a million people annually. The emergence of drug-resistant strains has further worsened the situation that demands urgent need for vaccines and novel drug development against Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb). The attenuated Mycobacterium bovis strain Bacille Calmette–Guerin (BCG) is the only FDA-licensed TB vaccine. BCG protects infants against disseminated TB, but it shows variable protection against adult pulmonary TB. Moreover, BCG can disseminate under immunosuppressed or immunocompromised conditions; hence, a safer and more efficacious TB vaccine is paramount. This requires a better understanding of the mechanisms that Mtb deploys to evade the host immune response.

Prolonged treatment regimens and poor drug compliance have led to the emergence of drug resistant strains and have thwarted international efforts to control this pandemic. A robust pipeline of new TB drug discovery and development is required for the successful development of new regimens. The recent second wave of anti-TB drug development that included Bedaquiline, Delamanid and Pretomanid offers the potential for shorter regimens and has been the driving force behind several translational studies and clinical trials in recent years. Finally, TB eradication programs suffered a major setback during the COVID-19 pandemic, and it is now time to join forces again in a concerted manner so that we can eradicate this scourge.

This Special Issue welcomes all types of manuscripts providing insight into aspects relevant to TB vaccines and novel drug development. We are interested in a wide scope of work including but not limited to basic science research and clinical studies. We welcome the submission of original articles, reviews and other research articles that will improve our knowledge in these areas. 

Dr. Sangeeta Tiwari
Dr. Shivani Singh
Guest Editors

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• tuberculosis vaccine
• recombinant BCG
• BCG prime boost regimens
• drug-resistant TB
• second-line TB drugs