Improving data use for decision making by neglected tropical disease program teams: eight use cases.

Background: The achievement of neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) program goals depends on numerous factors, including the ability of national programs to use high-quality, timely data to inform their decision-making and program delivery. This paper presents a use case analysis of the routine data used by national NTD programs targeting lymphatic filariasis, onchocerciasis, schistosomiasis, soil-transmitted helminthiasis, and trachoma. Methods: The use cases were developed through a combination of secondary and primary research focused on both global trends and deep dives into Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, and Tanzania. Results were refined through a stakeholder convening and the final eight use cases were determined through iteration and prioritization with stakeholders. Results: Eight use cases were developed: improve treatment register data quality, strengthen supervision of drug distributors during mass drug administration (MDA), generate accurate community-level population data for MDAs, create and manage an accurate inventory of drugs, meet district coverage targets during MDA campaigns, feedback and performance to sub-district teams, feedback on performance to sub-national teams, and national-level program use of data for evaluation and decision making. Each use case identifies key actors and their data-related needs and critical challenges, defines the current and desired state, and articulates the profile of a solution (digital and non-digital) needed to complete the use case. Conclusion: The systematic strengthening of data use for decision-making in NTD programs is key for reaching the 2030 Roadmap goals. Integrated together, the presented use cases, when translated into action using appropriate and innovative solutions, can help to ensure that accurate and timely data are present at every step of a program and empower countries to use these data to make program decisions.

Sources of antibiotics: Hot springs.

The discovery of antibiotics heralded an era of improved health care. However, the over-prescription and misuse of antibiotics resulted in the development of resistant strains of various pathogens. Since then, there has been an incessant search for discovering novel compounds from bacteria at various locations with extreme conditions. The soil is one of the most explored locations for bioprospecting. In recent times, hypersaline environments and symbiotic associations have been investigated for novel antimicrobial compounds. Among the extreme environments, hot springs are comparatively less explored. Many researchers have reported the presence of microbial life and secretion of antimicrobial compounds by microorganisms in hot springs. A pioneering research in the corresponding author's laboratory resulted in the identification of the antibiotic Fusaricidin B isolated from a hot spring derived eubacteria, Paenibacillus polymyxa, which has been assigned a new application for its anti-tubercular properties. The corresponding author has also reported anti-MRSA and anti-VRE activity of 73 bacterial isolates from hot springs in India.

Biodiversity in production of antibiotics and other bioactive compounds.

Microbes continue to play a highly considerable role in the drug discovery and development process. Nevertheless, the number of new chemical entities (NCEs) of microbial origin that has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been reduced in the past decade. This scarcity can be partly attributed to the redundancy in the discovered molecules from microbial isolates, which are isolated from common terrestrial ecological units. However, this situation can be partly overcome by exploring rarely exploited ecological niches as the source of microbes, which reduces the chances of isolating compounds similar to existing ones. The use of modern and advanced isolation techniques, modification of the existing fermentation methods, genetic modifications to induce expression of silent genes, analytical tools for the detection and identification of new chemical entities, use of polymers in fermentation to enhance yield of fermented compounds, and so on, have all aided in enhancing the frequency of acquiring novel compounds. These compounds are representative of numerous classes of diverse compounds. Thus, compounds of microbial origin and their analogues undergoing clinical trials continue to demonstrate the importance of compounds from microbial sources in modern drug discovery.

Antibacterial agents from actinomycetes - a review.

The discovery of Penicillin in 1928 and that of Streptomycin in 1943, has been pivotal to the exploration of nature as a source of new lead molecules. Globally, the microbiologist today is acknowledged as a crucial player in the drug discovery program. The microbial products, especially those from actinomycetes have been a phenomenal success for the past seven decades. Bioprospecting for new leads are often compounded by the recurrence of known antibiotics in newer microbial isolates. Despite all these deterrents, actinomycetes have proved to be a sustained mine of novel antibiotics, which selectively destroys the pathogens without affecting the host tissues. Each of these antibiotics is unique in their mode of action. Their versatility and immense economic value is something, which is extremely noteworthy. The anti-infective turn-over of over 79 billion US dollars in 2009, includes about 166 antibiotics and derivatives such as the Beta-lactam peptide antibiotics, the macrolide polyketide erythromycin, tetracyclines, aminoglycosides, daptomycin, tigecycline, most of which are produced by actinomycetes (1). Actinomycetes continue to play a highly significant role in drug discovery and development. Among the bioactive compounds that have been obtained so far from microbes, 45 % are produced by actinomycetes, 38 % by fungi and 17 % by unicellular eubacteria (2). Further many chemically synthesized drugs owe their origin to natural sources. In this review article, we highlight the recent antibiotics from actinomycetes with emphasis on their source, structures, activity, mechanism of action and current status.