Carl Zeiss Still Committed to the Fight against Tuberculosis

Special price for diagnostic microscope in even more countries

JENA, Germany — 22 March 2010. – Carl Zeiss is continuing its commitment to the fight against tuberculosis, a disease to which World TB Day on 24 March aims to draw the public’s attention every year. Carl Zeiss is now providing the Primo Star iLED fluorescence microscope at a more attractive price to 74 instead of 22 countries with a high incidence of tuberculosis. The countries that can benefit from this price are all countries that have a TB incidence of > 100 per 100 K population and, at the same time; are low- or low and middle-income economies. Carl Zeiss is a member of the Stop TB Initiative, whose aim is to eliminate TB as a public health problem and, ultimately, to contribute to a world free of tuberculosis.

Photo: Carl Zeiss is now providing the Primo Star iLED fluorescence microscope at a more attractive price to even more countries with a high incidence of tuberculosis.

The efficient, sturdy and easy-to-use Primo Star iLED microscope, developed and launched on the market by Carl Zeiss together with FIND (Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics) in 2008, allows better and up to 4 times faster detection of tuberculosis than with traditional techniques. The detection rate is estimated to be ten percent higher.

“To help more efficiently, we think it is essential to increase the number of countries with a high load of TB that can benefit from our particularly favorable price for the Primo Star iLED. We live our corporate social responsibility and we are strongly committed to help with our innovative technologies,” said Dr. Thomas Bocher, Business Unit Manager at Carl Zeiss MicroImaging GmbH.

This is a very promising announcement. We can only applaud the decision to make this improved and robust microscope more affordable to those regions that most need such a tool to better screen and provide earlier treatment to TB patients,” says Dr. Giorgio Roscigno, Chief Executive Officer of FIND. “I am glad to see that through our strong partnership with Carl Zeiss, we are making significant progress to make better diagnostics accessible to all.”

Today, TB, along with HIV and malaria, tops the statistics of fatal infectious diseases. One in three persons is infected with the tuberculosis bacterium. In view of the development of multi-resistant strains and HIV co-infection, the WHO estimates that TB will cause 30 million deaths in the next ten years.

Carl Zeiss
The Carl Zeiss Group is a leading group of companies operating worldwide in the optical and opto-electronic industries that generates revenues totaling around EUR 2.1 billion (2008/09). Carl Zeiss offers innovative solutions for the future-oriented markets of Medical and Research Solutions, Industrial Solutions and Lifestyle Products. The Carl Zeiss Group has approximately 13,000 employees worldwide, including more than 8,000 in Germany. The Carl Zeiss business groups hold leading positions in their markets. Carl Zeiss AG, Oberkochen, is fully owned by the Carl Zeiss Stiftung (Carl Zeiss Foundation).

Carl Zeiss MicroImaging
Carl Zeiss MicroImaging GmbH comprises the Microscopy Group of the Carl Zeiss Group. Carl Zeiss MicroImaging is one of the leading manufacturers of microscope systems and offers total solutions for biomedical research, the healthcare sector and high-tech industries. Its product line spans a broad spectrum from light microscopes and systems for laser scanning microscopy and spectrometry to hardware and software for image processing and documentation. Carl Zeiss MicroImaging GmbH is headquartered in Jena, Germany. Other manufacturing and development sites are located in Göttingen and Munich. In fiscal year 2008/09 the Microscopy Group at Carl Zeiss generated revenues of approximately EUR 365 million with a global workforce of around 1,700 people.

Further information is available at

www.zeiss.de/micro