Therapeutic Vaccines for Tuberculosis: An Overview

Abstract

Tuberculosis (TB), caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis is the world’s deadliest bacterial infection, resulting in more than 1.4 million deaths annually. The emergence of drug-resistance to first-line antibiotic therapy poses a threat to successful treatment, and novel therapeutic options are required, particularly for drug-resistant tuberculosis. One modality emerging for TB treatment is therapeutic vaccination. As opposed to preventative vaccination – the aim of which is to prevent getting infected by M. tuberculosis or developing active tuberculosis, the purpose of therapeutic vaccination is as adjunctive treatment of TB or to prevent relapse following cure. Several candidate therapeutic vaccines, using killed whole-cell or live attenuated mycobacteria, mycobacterial fragments and viral vectored vaccines are in current clinical trials. Other modes of passive immunization, including monoclonal antibodies directed against M. tuberculosis antigens are in various pre-clinical stages of development. Here, we will discuss these various therapeutics and their proposed mechanisms of action. Although the full clinical utility of therapeutic vaccination for the treatment of tuberculosis is yet to be established, they hold potential as useful adjunct therapies.

Nano-Delivery System of Ethanolic Extract of Propolis Targeting Mycobacterium tuberculosis via Aptamer-Modified-Niosomes

“…Tuberculosis (TB), principally caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex (Mtbc), is one of the pernicious airborne diseases and has been a major global health concern. According to recent reports, the number of new cases of TB has risen to over a million, with approximately half a million of these cases attributed to drug-resistance development and more than 1.4 million deaths annually [ 1 , 2 , 3 ]. TB infection with M. tuberculosis (Mtb) occurs mostly in the lungs through inhaled contaminated aerosols and residences within the alveolar macrophage facilitating the escape of Mtb from the immune response, resulting in unsuccessful treatment [ 4 ].…”

Machine Learning Prediction of Mycobacterial Cell Wall Permeability of Drugs and Drug-like Compounds

“…Besides the enzyme targets, the important roles of mycobacterial membranes [ 37 ] and transporters [ 38 , 39 ] as drug targets has been recognized, as well as the opportunities offered by the multi-target approaches [ 40 ] and host-directed therapies [ 35 , 41 ]. Promising studies of novel preventive and therapeutic TB vaccines [ 42 , 43 , 44 ] and nanocarrier-based approaches for the efficient and targeted delivery of anti-TB drugs and vaccines [ 45 , 46 ] are also ongoing.…”

Functions of exosomal non-coding RNAs to the infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis

“…Tuberculosis (TB) is a severe infectious disease that is still the major cause of death from infection, regardless of worldwide progress in health and diseases ( 1 , 2 ). Recent estimates from a new World Health Organization report show that ~1/4 of the international population are infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis ( M. tb ), which leads to 1.4 million deaths per year ( 3 , 4 ). Pathogenically, M. tb can survive for a long time in macrophages of tubercle granulomas in the human host ( 5 ).…”