TB Drug Research & Development Activity Questionnaire

What is the Stop TB Partnership Working Group on New Drugs?

One of the Stop TB Partnership's seven Working Groups, the Working Group on New Drugs is a forum to facilitate global collaborations for the development of new anti-TB drugs. The aim is to ensure the sustainability of tuberculosis control efforts through development of effective and affordable new therapeutics for TB.

The purpose of the Working Group is to ensure that scientists, academics, pharmaceutical companies, donors, multilaterals, and patients themselves are working together to speed the development of new drugs for TB. For more information on the Working Group, please visit the website at: http://www.stoptb.org/wg/new_drugs/.

What is the Purpose of This Questionnaire?

A robust and sustained pipeline of new anti-TB drug candidates and backup programs is essential to the development of new, faster-acting regimens. Since TB must be treated with a combination of drugs, it will be necessary to evaluate new drugs for compatibility and complementarity.

The Working Group on New TB Drugs serves as a venue for interaction among partners to increase efficiency and coordination in TB drug research and development. To facilitate information exchange, the Working Group conducts an annual survey of worldwide drug development activities. This exercise also identifies critical gaps in resources and capacity.

The Working Group is interested in gathering information about clinical, pre-clinical, and drug discovery projects (such as compound screening campaigns against organisms or specific drug targets). Additionally, information on basic research is requested, including exploration of target essentiality, structural biology (target crystallization, docking, virtual screening, etc.), elucidation of biochemical pathways, the biological basis of persistence, etc.