Update on TB Therapies in Development on November 1 Teleconference.

Global Alliance for TB Drug Development Convenes Multiple Stakeholders For Briefing on Data Presented at IUATLD and ICAAC 

What: Teleconference to recap presentations given on TB therapies in
    development from the IUATLD conference in Paris and the ICAAC
    conference in Washington DC. Latest scientific studies and results
    will be shared; briefings from the Global Alliance for TB Drug
    Development (TB Alliance), leading pharmaceutical companies and
    academic laboratories will participate. There will be a Q&A
    session for journalists.

Why: New findings on the impact of TB and the critical need for the
    globally coordinated pipeline; response has been catalyzed and
    managed by the TB Alliance, a public private partnership created
    only four years ago to develop affordable, faster-acting drugs.

    Tuberculosis infects one third of the world's population and is
        the oldest known human infection, but no new drugs have been
        introduced in over thirty years. There were few, if any, new
        candidates in development a decade ago. Standard TB treatment
        regimens for active carriers of the disease are
        resource-intensive and difficult to comply with due to their
        complexity and length (3-4 separate drugs for 6-9 months).
        Treatment of multi-drug resistant TB is difficult, costly, and
        far less effective, and a majority of MDR-TB strains are now
        resistant to three of the four first-line drugs. TB is the
        leading killer of AIDS patients, but simultaneous TB-HIV
        treatment is prevented by drug-drug interactions between some
        ARVs and old TB drugs.


    The TB Alliance has brought together leading researchers, industry
        actors, and public health advocates to realize the first, most
        comprehensive TB drug pipeline since the 1960s.


   Who:

   --  Dr. Mel Spigelman, Global Alliance for TB Drug Development (TB
        Alliance)

   --  Dr. Doris Rouse, RTI International

   --  Dr. Thomas Keller, Novartis Institute for Tropical Diseases
        (NITD)

   --  Dr. Carol Nacy, Sequella Inc.

   --  Dr. Scott Franzblau, University of Illinois at Chicago

   How: US dial in + 800-223-9488 / International dial in
[phone]

   Conference ID # 7TBDRUG

   When: Monday, November 1, 2004, 9.00 - 9.30 am EST time (2.00 -
2:30 pm GMT)

   Contact: Brenda Timm - [phone] - [e-mail]

   Editors Note: Please use the following link to review information
referenced on the call http://www.tballiance.org/novartis.asp