Atlanta Lawyer Reclassified with MDR-TB

Oops. Atlanta lawyer Andrew Speaker doesn't have extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB), after all. Press reports indicate his diagnosis is being changed to multi-drug-resistant TB (MDR-TB). Still means he's likely in for a couple of years of treatment but his chances of survival are better than if he had XDR-TB.

While others will take jabs at the Centers for Disease Control for allegedly overblowing the whole affair, a smarter view is to focus on the state of TB diagnostic tests--which haven't really been updated in decades. Even the new TB tests coming down the pike are not terribly effective, according to Real Health News.