Eisai Joins Ground-Breaking Tuberculosis Drug Accelerator Partnership to Discover New Tuberculosis Treatments

Eisai Joins Ground-BreakingEisai Joins Ground-Breaking Tuberculosis Drug Accelerator Partnership to Discover New Tuberculosis Treatments PR Newswire HATFIELD, England, November 25, 2013 Eisai announced today that it has become a signatory to the Tuberculosis Drug Accelerator (TBDA) partnership, a ground-breaking initiative that aims to speed up the discovery of essential new treatments for tuberculosis (TB). Launched in June 2012 through a collaborative agreement between several [1] [2]pharmaceutical companies, research institutions and with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the TBDA partnership targets the discovery of new TB drugs by working together on early-stage research. The long-term goal of the partnership is to create a new TB drug combination that has the potential to cure patients in one month only, compared to the six months of treatment required by existing treatments. As a TBDA member, Eisai will provide targeted sections of its compound libraries for screening against TB and share identified and confirmed hits with other TBDA partners. Eisai will also work cooperatively with other partners to facilitate the development of new therapies for TB. TB is a contagious disease caused by a bacterial infection that affects the [1]lungs and other organs. Although it is a curable and preventable disease, TB is the second leading infectious cause of death worldwide, having [1]resulted in the deaths of 1.3 million people in 2012 alone.