American Thoracic Society, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, European Respiratory Society, Infectious Diseases Society of America.

No abstract

RESUMO: O isolamento social imposto pela pandemia da COVID-19 traz à tona, de forma potencializada, alguns indicadores preocupantes sobre a violência doméstica e a violência familiar contra a mulher. As organizações voltadas ao enfrentamento da violência doméstica já observaram aumento da violência doméstica por causa da coexistência forçada, do estresse econômico e de temores sobre o coronavírus. O artigo busca estabelecer algumas relações entre o isolamento social durante a pandemia da COVID-19 e o aumento da violência contra as mulheres, levando em conta o contexto de uma sociedade patriarcal. Foram analisados dados, ainda incipientes, publicados pela imprensa de diversos países, bem como relatórios de organizações internacionais e organizações direcionadas ao enfrentamento da violência doméstica. Paralelamente, fez-se uma breve revisão de literatura com autores que discutem o papel social da mulher na sociedade. Palavras-chave:Coronavírus. Isolamento social. Violência doméstica. Violência contra a mulher.Isolamento social e o aumento da violência doméstica: o que isso nos revela?

We examined sputum bacterial loads in adults with newly diagnosed tuberculosis using quantitative culture and time-until-positive (DTP) culture in BACTEC 460. Patients with cavitary disease had higher CFU levels than those without cavities and shorter DTPs. Within radiographic strata of moderately and far advanced tuberculosis, higher CFU counts were associated with cavitary disease.

Rationale: Cavitary disease and delayed culture conversion have been associated with relapse. Combining patient characteristics and measures of bacteriologic response might allow treatment shortening with current drugs in some patients. Objectives: To assess whether treatment could be shortened from 6 to 4 months in patients with noncavitary tuberculosis whose sputum cultures converted to negative after 2 months. Methods: This study was a randomized, open-label equivalence trial. HIV-uninfected adults with noncavitary tuberculosis were treated daily with isoniazid, rifampin, pyrazinamide, and ethambutol for 2 months, followed by 2 months of isoniazid and rifampin. After 4 months, patients with drug-susceptible TB whose sputum cultures on solid media were negative after 8 weeks of treatment were randomly assigned to continue treatment for 2 more months or to stop treatment. Patients were followed for relapse for 30 months after beginning treatment. Measurements and Main Results: Enrollment was stopped by the safety monitoring committee after 394 patients were enrolled due to apparent increased risk for relapse in the 4-month arm. A total of 370 patients were eligible for per protocol analysis. Thirteen patients in the 4-month arm relapsed, compared with three subjects in the 6-month arm (7.0 vs. 1.6%; risk difference, 0.054; 95% confidence interval with Hauck-Anderson correction, 0.01-0.10). Conclusion: Shortening treatment from 6 to 4 months in adults with noncavitary disease and culture conversion after 2 months using current drugs resulted in a greater relapse rate. The combination of noncavitary disease and 2-month culture conversion was insufficient to identify patients with decreased risk for relapse.

Although further research is needed, this study suggests that conditional cash transfer programmes can contribute to improve TB cure rate in Brazil.

BackgroundAlthough extrapulmonary tuberculosis (EPTB) is less frequent than Pulmonary Tuberculosis (PTB) and is a secondary target for national TB control programs, its significance has increased worldwide during the HIV epidemic. The objective of this study was to examine the epidemiology of EPTB in Brazil between 2007 and 2011.MethodsCross-sectional study involving all cases of TB reported to the Brazilian Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System (Sistema de Informações de Agravo de Notificação - SINAN) in Brazil between 2007 and 2011. Sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of patients with exclusively PTB and exclusively EPTB were compared. Following analysis with Pearson’s chi-square test, variables with p < 0.05 were included in a hierarchical regression model. Variables with p < 0.05 in the corresponding level were kept in the model.ResultsA total of 427,548 cases of TB were included. Of these, 356,342 cases (83.35%; 95% confidence interval (CI) 83.23% - 83.45%) were PTB, 57,217 (13.37%; 95% CI 13.28% - 13.48%) were EPTB, 13,989 (3.27%; 95% CI 3.21% - 3.32%) were concurrent pulmonary and extrapulmonary TB. Patients with EPTB were mainly white (16.7%), and most (29.1%) patients had five to eight years of education. Among comorbidities, HIV infection was prominent (OR 2.15; 95% CI 2.09 – 2.21), although the proportion of cases awaiting test results or untested was high (39%). Ethanol use (OR 0.45; 95% CI 0.43 – 0.46), diabetes mellitus (OR 0.54; 95% CI 0.51 – 0.57) and mental illness (OR 0.88; 95% CI 0.82 – 0.95) were associated with PTB.ConclusionsThirteen percent of patients diagnosed with TB in Brazil have only EPTB. More effective diagnostic strategies and control measures are needed to reduce the number of cases of extrapulmonary TB in Brazil.

Rationale: Linezolid, the first oxazolidinone approved for clinical use, has effective in vitro and promising in vivo activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Objectives: To evaluate the early and extended early bactericidal activity of linezolid in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis.Methods: Randomized open label trial. Thirty patients with newly diagnosed smear-positive pulmonary tuberculosis (10 per arm) were assigned to receive isoniazid (300 mg daily) and linezolid (600 mg twice daily or 600 mg once daily) for 7 days. Sputum for quantitative culture was collected for 2 days before and then daily during 7 days of study drug administration. Bactericidal activity was estimated by measuring the decline in bacilli during the first 2 days (early bactericidal activity) and the last 5 days of study drug administration (extended early bactericidal activity). Measurements and Main Results:The mean early bactericidal activity of isoniazid (0.67 log 10 cfu/ml/d) was greater than that of linezolid twice and once daily (0.26 and 0.18 log 10 cfu/ml/d, respectively). The extended early bactericidal activity of linezolid between Days 2 and 7 was minimal. Conclusions: Linezolid has modest early bactericidal activity against rapidly dividing tubercle bacilli in patients with cavitary pulmonary tuberculosis during the first 2 days of administration, but little extended early bactericidal activity. Clinical trial registered with www.clinicaltrials.gov (NCT00396084).