Translating scientific discoveries during pandemics: ensuring equity for people affected by COVID-19 and tuberculosis

Abstract

The coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 has reached almost every corner of the globe. Trillions of dollars are being invested in the COVID-19 pandemic response to support frontline clinical and public health efforts and spur rapid advances in scientific research. Concurrently, we are in the grip of a pandemic of greater longevity that receives scant public attention despite causing 4000 deaths each day [1]. It strikes disproportionately at the poor, treatment is unsatisfactory, and there is no effective vaccine with lasting immunity. This is tuberculosis (TB), another respiratory pathogen that has much in common with COVID-19. In contrast to COVID-19, citizens of rich countries do not feel threatened by TB, which has long been associated with poverty and is therefore not a strategic priority. The rise in isolationism, nationalism, xenophobia, and racism has had negative impacts on health policy that have impaired global and national responses to TB [2]. It is against these barriers that the global response to COVID-19 has also been struggling. Worryingly, early models predict that the COVID-19 pandemic may drive an additional 6.3 million TB cases and 1.3 million deaths by 2025 [3] and early data indicate interactions between these diseases [4, 5]. Despite the political rhetoric suggesting that “we are all in this together” when it comes to COVID-19, closer inspection through the lens of TB reminds us that when it comes to benefitting from scientific advances to improve health, we are not all equal.

Abstract

The #COVID19 pandemic has emphasised major global health inequities: this editorial argues lessons learnt from TB must remind us of the gaps in the research agenda that must be addressed to ensure that scientific advances are equitably disseminated https://bit.ly/3bTZHS3