Tolerability of rifapentine-based regimens in latent tuberculosis infection treatment in the elderly

Extract

Management of latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) is a core intervention in the pursuit of tuberculosis (TB) elimination and is one of the eight activities recommended by the World Health Organization [1]. We read with great interest the paper by Gao et al. [2] investigating two short-course regimens with rifapentine plus isoniazid for the treatment of LTBI in Chinese patients aged 50–70 years. They reported that due to the ever-increasing occurrence of adverse events, the 3-month once-weekly regimen and the 2-month twice-weekly regimen were truncated to 8 and 6 weeks, respectively. Gao et al. [2] concluded that the short regimens tested must be used with caution among the elderly because of a high frequency of adverse events. The findings reported by Gao et al. [2] were not consistent with our experience in Taiwan.