Cepheid announced that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) representing the intention of the company, working with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), to support the White House's National Action Plan for Combating Multidrug-Resistant Tuberculosis.

The National Action Plan identifies critical interventions to be taken by United States Government agencies and partners to reverse the worldwide spread of multidrug-resistant (MDR) tuberculosis (TB). The MoU is expected to be followed by a Collaborative Agreement between Cepheid and USAID setting out the details of this cooperation.

Tuberculosis is the biggest infectious disease killer in the world. Although TB is curable, 1.5 million people died from the disease in 2014 - often as result of delayed diagnosis and incorrect treatment. Inappropriate treatment can also lead to MDR-TB which is resistant to the two most effective anti-TB drugs, and extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB) which is resistant to most anti-TB drugs. Each year, more than 480,000 people will develop MDR-TB, yet fewer than 20% will be diagnosed and started on appropriate treatment. The National Action Plan calls for aggressive interventions to diagnose and treat MDR-TB so that by 2020, 50% of patients with MDR-TB in the countries with the highest burdens will be diagnosed and correctly treated. In order to reach these targets, the National Action Plan will accelerate detection of drug-resistant TB by scaling up proven technologies and supporting continued innovation.

"USAID is proud to partner with Cepheid in the global fight against TB," said Dr. Ariel Pablos-Méndez, USAID Assistant Administrator for Global Health. "As a result of Cepheid's leadership in developing and rolling out innovative TB diagnostic techniques, people with TB or MDR-TB can now get an accurate diagnosis and start taking life-saving medicines within just a few hours, rather than having to wait weeks for their test results. This innovation will dramatically increase our ability to save lives and bring us closer to our goal of creating a TB-free world."

"Since WHO endorsement of the Xpert MTB/RIF test in December of 2010, Cepheid has delivered more than 4,000 GeneXpert Systems and shipped more than 15 million test cartridges to the countries most affected by a treatable condition that continues to cause more than a million deaths each year," said John Bishop, Cepheid's chairman and chief executive officer. "Cepheid is proud to be a leading innovator in molecular tuberculosis testing, and we look forward to partnering with USAID and others to implement the White House plan. In particular, the introduction of our portable, battery-operated and wireless communication-enabled GeneXpert Omni later this year is expected to enable laboratory-quality molecular diagnostics to be deployed even closer to patients in resource-limited areas. With innovations like these, the global community has the opportunity, for the first time, to coordinate access to precision medicine strategies enabling achievement of the 2020 goals."

With more than 9,200 systems in 182 countries, the GeneXpert System is the world's most popular molecular diagnostics' instrument. The GeneXpert System's modular configuration means that the system is the most scalable available, offering the ability to perform from one to eighty Xpert tests at the same time. As a result, the GeneXpert System meets the throughput requirements of customers of all sizes - from lower volume point-of-care settings to higher volume reference laboratories - enabling accurate, fast and cost effective test results.

Based in Sunnyvale, California, Cepheid  is a leading molecular diagnostics company that is dedicated to improving healthcare by developing, manufacturing, and marketing accurate yet easy-to-use molecular systems and tests.