Figure I.

Persistent effects of early therapeutic intervention in tuberculosis (TB) .

Lung inflammation continues for the first few weeks after the start of efficacious TB antibiotic therapy, which results in ongoing damage. A short-term intervention of doxycycline for 2 weeks still had significant effects on gene expression and protein concentrations of tissue-damaging matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) at 8 weeks, demonstrating that, if the immune response is diverted toward health early in treatment, this trajectory is maintained. This reduction in inflammation reduces the overall lung immunopathology during treatment. Figure created with BioRender (www.BioRender.com). Abbreviation: Abx, antibiotics.