Challenges of Immune Response Diversity in the Human Population Concerning New Tuberculosis Diagnostics, Therapies, and Vaccines

Universal approaches to the prevention and treatment of human diseases fail to take into account profound immune diversity resulting from genetic variations across populations. Personalized or precision medicine takes into account individual lifestyle, environment, and biology (genetics and immune status) and is being adopted in several disease intervention strategies such as cancer and heart disease. However, its application in infectious diseases, particularly global diseases such as tuberculosis (TB), is far more complex and in a state of infancy. Here, we discuss the impact of human genetic variations on immune responses and how they relate to failures seen in current TB diagnostic, therapy, and vaccine approaches across populations. We offer our perspective on the challenges and potential for more refined approaches going forward.