RetireJapan

Sincerely hope that for your buddy it is (was?) not one of the resistant strains.

AreTheyTheLemmings? wrote: ↑Mon Sep 02, 2024 10:05 am Really interesting. Thank you.

I remember being shocked, genuinely shocked when a work colleague got tuberculosis. "T-bloody-B? In Japan?! But this is the 1990s!"
I had believed that TB had been all but eradicated, at least from the developed world; to me it was something that old people talked about as "consumption."

Yes, it was mostly eradicated, but as more people from Africa, India etc immigrated,along with cultural acceptance of spitting. It triggered the re-emergence. Not to mention that some people, when they got it, got treated, felt better.Then stopped taking the meds cause they felt great.and although they felt great the TB hadn't cleared their system.Requiring more treatment. And with each uncleared cycle the re-emergence of drug resistant TB emerged.With some countries actually considering locking people who persistantly refuse to follow treatment regimes because we now have only ONE DRUG TO CLEAR the resistant TB. As you mentioned people thought it was consigned to history, and drug companies lost interest in making new drugs.
However I think some new drugs have come online.

People have the same thoughts about polio today because they've never met anyone with the disease.And i guess the awesome success of the vaccines erradicating some diseases has allowed, for the anti,vaxers,along with the power of the internet, a space for these conditions to re-emerge as herd immunity is reduced.
In these cases, insurance coverage or not, its better to treat them as the benefits are massive.