When Henry first got sick, he was treated—like almost everyone diagnosed with TB in poor countries—with the RIPE drugs,[*2] a combination of Rifampin, Isoniazid, Pyrazinamide, and Ethambutol. You probably don’t need to remember the names of these drugs, but it’s worth noting that all four of them are over fifty years old, and many forms of tuberculosis have developed resistance to one or more of the drugs, a condition known as drug-resistant TB, or DR-TB.
