The spread of drug-resistant tuberculosis may result in 75 million deaths by 2050, experts have declared. It could also cost the global economy a cumulative $16.7 trillion (£15 trillion) - the equivalent of the European Union's annual output. The comments have come from a UK Parliamentary group which focuses on TB. They follow a warning from the World Health Organisation which said last year that multidrug-resistant TB was at 'crisis levels', with about 480,000 new cases in 2013. X-ray of tuberculosis calcification caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis Bacteria . It is a man-made problem caused by regular TB patients given the wrong medicines or doses, or failing to complete their treatment, which is highly toxic and can take up two years. The fight against TB, the world's second deadliest infectious disease after HIV, is also hampered by a lack of an effective vaccine, the APPG TB said. The only TB vaccine, BCG, protects some children from severe forms of TB - including one that affects the brain - but is unreliable in preventing TB in the lung, which is the most common form of the disease. TB, which spreads through the coughs and sneezes of an infected person, killed 1.5 million people worldwide in 2013, according to the WHO. Yesterday it warned that if left untackled, drug-resistant TB superbugs threaten to shrink the world economy by 0.63 percent annually. As a result, governments must do more to improve research and cooperation, the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Global Tuberculosis (APPG TB), said. The problem stems from the fact that bacteria that cause TB can develop resistance to drugs used to cure the disease. Multidrug-resistant TB fails to respond to at least isoniazid and rifampicin, the two most powerful anti-TB drugs, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The World Health Organisation warned last year that multidrug-resistant TB(pictured) was at 'crisis levels', with about 480,000 new cases in 2013 . The UK parliamentary group's cost projections are based on a scenario in which an additional 40 per cent of all TB cases are resistant to first-line drugs, leading to a doubling of the infection rate. 'The rising global burden of multidrug-resistant TB and other drug-resistant infections will come at a human and economic cost which the global community simply cannot afford to ignore', economist Jim O'Neill said in a statement. Mr O'Neill, a former chief at investment bank Goldman Sachs, was appointed last year by British Prime Minister David Cameron to head a review into antimicrobial resistance. The group urged governments to set up a research and development fund, target investments into basic research and increase support for bilateral TB programs. 'We need better tools to deal with this new threat, but since TB primarily affects the poorest and most vulnerable in society, there is little commercial incentive to develop new drugs,' said Nick Herbert, co-chairman of the APPG TB.
Could also cost the global economy a cumulative $16.7 trillion (£15 trillion)
Comments have come from UK Parliamentary group which focuses on TB . World Health Organisation warned last year that multidrug-resistant TB was at 'crisis levels' - and exacerbated by fact there is no vaccine .