AIDS and Tuberculosis: A Deadly Liaison

The immune deficiency AIDS leads to a drastic increase in susceptibility to Tuberculosis. Accordingly, co-infections of tuberculosis (TB) and AIDS have increased dramatically over the last decades and have already killed more than 5 million people worldwide. Currently, no vaccines are available for either of these diseases leaving doctors with limited options for prevention. This perfect storm of pandemics is analysed and explained for the first time in this groundbreaking title, edited by two of the most accomplished experts in this area, Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Stefan Kaufmann at the Max-Planck Institute for infectious diseases in Berlin, Germany, and Prof. Dr. Bruce Walker, director of the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard in Boston, USA. Co-infection of AIDS and TB occur frequently in the most impoverished regions of the world and the AIDS pandemic which has spread rapidly across Africa over the past two decades is now being met by a TB pandemic. While TB can be cured and AIDS can be treated, co-infection in a single patient presents unique challenges and the rapid expansion of these two pandemics has resulted in a critical need to better understand the interactions between the two pathogens and to integrate research efforts. This title brings together scientists from the forefront of research to explore and combine state-of-the-art studies in drug interactions and disease therapies, providing the latest information about prevention, therapy and diagnosis of both tuberculosis and AIDS.