Common heartburn drugs could speed up tuberculosis treatment (PPIs)

Medical Xpress / UK Research and Innovation / Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ^ | Feb. 6, 2023 | Alexandra M. Lake et al

[ConservativeMind]

Researchers have discovered that over-the-counter drugs commonly used to treat heartburn could shorten the treatment of tuberculosis (TB). These drugs could also reduce the chances of the bacteria that causes TB from becoming drug resistant.

The findings may mean TB can be cured with shorter treatments.

TB typically takes months to treat with multiple drugs. This poses logistical challenges in completing treatment for many people.

When we're infected, TB bacteria enter our tissues and invade cells that make up part of our immune system, called macrophages. When they get there, they turn on pumps in their cell membranes that pump out the antibiotics we use against them. This renders the bacteria tolerant to the antibiotics, a reason it takes so long to treat TB.

Ramakrishnan and her colleagues decided to test if a cardiac and blood pressure drug called verapamil, which blocks human cell membrane pumps, could also block the bacterial cell membrane pump.

To do this, they used a neat approach in which they tagged an antibiotic typically used to treat TB, rifampicin, with a fluorescent marker. This meant they could directly see that verapamil does indeed stop the bacteria ejecting rifampicin.

The researchers then wondered if other drugs in wide use for all sorts of conditions, which also incidentally block human cell membrane pumps, could have the same effect on the TB bacterial pumps as verapamil.

Professor Lalita Ramakrishnan said, "The most stunning of all was the class of proton pump inhibitors that are among the most widely used, over the counter drugs for heartburn, reflux, gastritis—omeprazole, pantoprazole, lansoprazole, rabeprazole.

"Not only do they work, but they work possibly with even greater potency than verapamil. This is very cool, because one of the holy grails of TB treatment is can we come up with shortening regimes.

[ConservativeMind]

This is a great reuse of cheap drugs.

[ConservativeMind]

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[Revel]

The possible side effects of those drugs reads like a scary movie. I Took a prilosec once and thought I was going to die. The one that worked without side effects was Ranitidine. Then they pulled it because it contained Bacon.