The country has the world’s largest number of multi-drug-resistant cases – but doctors and activists warn patients are going undiagnosed and untreated
A big reason for this is price: a six-month course of bedaquiline costs the government about $350 a patient, because of a patent held by the pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson. Another recommended drug, delamanid, is patented by the Japanese firm Otsuka Pharmaceutical and costs $1,200 a head.
“By just offering bedaquiline in Mumbai, you could be driving bedaquiline resistance itself,” she warns. Yadav was first diagnosed with TB in 2013, but the treatment she was given did not work and she became drug resistant. She lost a lung, and Yadav’s husband, fearing that their infant son would contract TB, kicked her out of the family home.Last year, Yadav, who now campaigns for better treatment, filed a lawsuit against the government, demanding that it override the patents ofthe two drugs, which it can do under a World Trade Organization agreement.
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