REVIEW SERIES Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease v 12: New treatments for COPD

Drugs currently available or under development for the treatment of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are reviewed. More research on the basic cellular and molecular mechanisms of COPD and emphysema is urgently needed to aid the logical development of new treatments for this common and important disease for which no effective preventative treatments currently exist. There is a major need to develop newtreatments for chronic obstructive pulmo-nary disease (COPD), as no currently avail-able drug therapy reduces the relentless progres-sion of the disease. In particular, there is a need to develop drugs that control the underlying inflam-matory and destructive processes. There have been few therapeutic advances in the drug treat-ment of COPD, in contrast to the enormou