Zumla and the UCL/Zambia
team at the awards ceremony
A UCL research and training project centered on a diagnostic test for tuberculosis (TB) won the Times Higher Education (THE) International Collaboration of the Year award at a ceremony in London last week. The project, led by Professor Alimuddin Zumla (UCL Infection & Immunity), set out to test the effectiveness of new diagnostic technology used in Zambia and Tanzania. The test was found to be simple to use, gave a result within two hours, and could also detect drug-resistant forms of TB. TB still leads to about 1.4 million deaths across the world each year, according to the World Health Organisation, despite treatment being effective and cheap. The problem is a lack of quick, accurate diagnoses. The judges noted that the UCL initiative "stood out for the quality of its research and the international collaboration that it entailed." They added: "Tuberculosis is a global emergency that has needed a breakthrough badly. That breakthrough is now at hand thanks to this year's winning entry.
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