Swiss-based pharmaceuticals giant Novartis said today that it has signed a licensing deal with an international organisation that fights tuberculosis.
The exclusive worldwide licensing agreement with the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development covered compounds discovered at the Novartis Institutes for Tropical Diseases, the group said.
Under the terms of agreement, Novartis will fully transfer its TB research and development programme to the Global Alliance.
The latter will take financial and operational responsibility for continued research, development, approval and distribution of compounds in the portfolio, Novartis said.
Pharmaceuticals in the deal include a novel class of drugs called indolcarboxamides that are active against drug sensitive and multi-resistant strains of TB.
TB claimed 1.3 million lives worldwide last year, making it the deadliest disease after AIDS to be caused by a single infectious agent, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
There are 8.6 million cases of TB every year according to WHO, and that drug-resistant forms are a huge emerging threat.
TB hotspots include China, India and the former communist countries of eastern Europe and central Asia.
The WHO last month called for a massive new international effort to try to wipe out TB by 2050.
