Meetings on Neglected Diseases, Developing Treatments and Ensuring Access.

• Announcement for MSF-Sponsored Meeting, June 8, 2005, London. Ensuring Innovation for Neglected Diseases.
• April 29, 2003. International Meeting on a global framework for supporting health research and development (R&D) in areas of market and public policy failure. Hosted by Medicins Sans Frontieres, Consumer Project on Technology, OxFam, Health Action International and the Third World Network.
• March 14, 2002. Crisis of Neglected Diseases: Developing Treatments and Ensuring Access. Conference hosted by Medicins Sans Frontieres, Consumer Project on Technology, OxFam and Health Action International.
  • Main Conference Page
  • Summary of Conference
  • May 13, 2002. Ricki Lewis for the Scientist. Fighting the 10/90 Gap.

Medecins Sans Frontieres Documents

• May, 2004. Fact sheet prepared for the 57th World Health Assembly. SLEEPING SICKNESS - or Human African Trypanosomiasis.
• September 22, 2003. Joint publication with the World Health Organization. Surmounting challenges: procurement of antiretroviral medicines in low- and middle-income countries.
  • Full Report.
  • Press Release.
• Doctors Without Borders Delivers Petition Calling for More Research & Development for Neglected Diseases That Kill 14 Million Every Year.
• Petitions to both President Bush and PhRMA. Please sign before May 14, 2003.
• September 19, 2002. Press release. Lack of appropriate vaccine catches world community unprepared as unusual strain of meningitis threatens African countries.
• June 22, 2002. Patrice Trouiller, Piero Olliaro, Els Torreele, James Orbinski, Richard Laing, and Nathan Ford for the Lancet. Drug Development For Neglected Diseases: A Deficient Market And A Public-Health Policy Failure.
• February 14, 2002. Press release. Urgent need to kick-start R&D for killer diseases in poor countries.
• February 13, 2002. Jean-Marie Kindermans, Co-authors: Bernard Pécoul, Carmen Perez-Casas, Margriet Den Boer, Daniel Berman, and Ingrid Cox. Changing national malaria treatment protocols in Africa: What is the cost and who will pay?
  • Text of the Report
  • Press Release. Number One Killer of Children in Africa Too Expensive to Treat Effectively?
• December 19, 2001. Nathan Ford and Els Toreelle for the MSF Working Group on Neglected Diseases. Letter to the Editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Neglected Diseases of Global Importance. Link also includes a response to their letter from Gregory Folkers and Anothony Fauci of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
• October 10, 2001. MSF Cananda press release. MSF calls on public investment to support neglected disease research: 1999 Nobel Peace prize money goes to research for treating diseases of the poor.
• October 9, 2001. MSF Report and press release. Fatal Imbalance: The Crisis in Research and Development for Drugs for Neglected Diseases. Also, see Ed Silverman's story in the Star-Ledger about this report.
• January 27, 1999. Bernard Pécoul, Pierre Chirac, Patrice Trouiller, and Jacques Pinel in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Access to Essential Drugs in Poor Countries- A Lost Battle?

CPTech Documents

• James Love, The Benifits of a Treaty on R&D. PPT presentation given at The Drugs for Neglected Diseases (DND) Working Group, in Rio de Janerio, Brazil, on December 3, 2002.

Institutions Researching Tropical Diseases

• World Health Organization Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseaeses.
• UNDP-World Bank-WHO Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases. This group relies on voluntary contributions from countries and foundations to fund its research and other activities. The program's objectives, as described in its literature are:

  Research and Development: to improve existing and develop new approaches for preventing, diagnosing, treating, and controlling neglected infectious diseases which are applicable, acceptable and affordable by developing endemic countries, which can be readily integrated into the health services of these countries, and which focus on the health problems of the poor

  Training and Strengthening: to strengthen the capacity of developing endemic countries to undertake the research required for developing and implementing these new and improved disease control approaches

• Global Forum for Health Research. Also see the May, 2002 press release, Narrowing the Gap in Health Research Funding.
• Tanzania National Institute for Medical Research.

• December 2003. International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Associations. Neglected Diseases and the Pharmaceutical Industry
  • Press release.
  • Full Document.

Misc. Documents

• June 22, 2005. European Parliament Committee on Development. Reporton Major and Neglected Diseases in Developing Countries.
• December 4, 2004. Andrew Farlow for the Lancet. Book Review of Over the rainbow: the pot of gold for neglected diseases, by Michael Kremer and Rachel Glennerster. Strong Medicine: Creating Incentives for Pharmaceutical Research on Neglected Diseases.
• February 5, 2003. European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations press release. EFPIA welcomes increased public funding for diseases of poverty, but warns against undermining future research.
• April 1, 2003. Luis Jódar, F Marc LaForce, Costante Ceccarini, Teresa Aguado, Dan M Granoff in the Lancet. Meningococcal conjugate vaccine for Africa: a model for development of new vaccines for the poorest countries.
• Tuberculosis
  • CPTech page on R&D for PA-824, a pipeline Anti-Tuberculosis drug.
  • Global Alliance for TB Drug Development.
  • South Africa's Tuberculosis Researchand Development Coalition.
  • Sequella Global Tuberculosis Foundation.
  • February 8, 2000. Capetown Declaration on TB Drug Development.
• Onchocerciasis (River Blindness)
  • NIH page on research funding
  • WHO Page on New Onchocerciasis Treatments in the Development Pipline.
  • Diagnostics in the Development Pipeline.
  • Dutch Royal Tropical Institute page on Onchocerciasis research.
  • October 8, 2002. Joint press release. Former U.S. President Carter, Merck Chairman Raymond V. Gilmartin Present Model For Addressing Global Public-Health Challenges. Centers around Merck's donation program for its drug that fights onchocerciasis.
  • December 14, 2001. Charles Cobb for allafrica.com. Elimination Of River Blindness 'Possible Within Ten Years.'
• NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. NIAID Expands Malaria Research Efforts.
• London School of Hygene and Tropical Medicine Gates Malaria Programme
• September 30, 2003. John G. Bartlett, MD. Document presented at the 43rd Annual Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. Why Is Big Pharmacy Getting Out of Anti-infective Drug Discovery?
• June 2001. Volker Lehman. Biotechnology and Development Monitor, No. 46, p. 2-7. New models for public-private partnerships in drug development. Includes a useful table of public-private partnerships formed to research neglected diseases.
• September 21, 1999. President Clinton's Remarks to the UN on the Global Health Care Gap.

News Stories

• March 29, 2007. Washington Post editorial. A Dose of Innovation.
• June 19, 2005. Banasree Purkayastha for the Financial Express. Glamourless diseases - With commercial interests driving drug research, diseases like kala-azar fail to attract funds.
• February 19, 2005. Op-ed by Michael Rawlins in the British Medical Journal. "Priority medicines for Europe and the world" is a wake up call from WHO.
• December 6, 2004. Victoria Hale for Newsweek. Creating More Paths to Hope.
• November 29, 2004. Stephen Foley for the London Independent. GSK Asks Blair for Tax and Patent Incentives for Research Into Neglected Diseases.
• April 29, 2004. Judith Mandelbaum-Schmid for In Focus. New generation of non-profit initiatives tackles world's "neglected" diseases.
• February 8, 2004. Associated Press. Prescription for the developing world: Nonprofit buys rights to drugs long ignored by Western firms.
• September 12, 2003. Zina Moukheiber for Forbes. Protecting The Orphan Drugs.
• June 12, 2003. Op-ed by Richard Rockefeller for the Boston Globe. A Fatal Imbalance.
• May 15, 2003. Joe De Capua for Voice of America News. Neglected Diseases Kill 14 Million People A Year.
• May 4, 2003. Kitta MacPherson for the new Jersey Star-Ledger. Spotlight skips over many other outbreaks.
• March 29, 2003. Jocalyn Clark for the British Medical Journal. Euro MPs vote on research fund for neglected diseases.
• September 26, 2002. DCMilitary.com. Navy Medicine awarded patent.
• September 20, 2002. Naomi Koppel for the Associated Press. Aid groups: tens of thousands could die from new meningitis strain.
• August 19, 2002. David Perlman for the San Francisco Chronicle. Drug firm seeks cures over cash S.F. nonprofit wants to help poor nations.
• May 28, 2002. Donald McNeil for the New York Times. New Malaria Drug Pits US Against Africa.
• May 13, 2002. Ricki Lewis for the Scientist. Fighting the 10/90 Gap.
• May 13, 2002. Ricki Lewis for the Scientist. African Sleeping Sickness: A Recurring Epidemic.
• March 14. Alan Mozes for Reuters. Research on Drugs for 'Neglected Diseases' Urged.
• March 12, 2002. Penny Fannin for The Age. Drug firms ignoring killer diseases: report.
• February 14, 2002. Theresa Agovino for the Associated Press. Nonprofits Seek to Develop Drugs.
• February 14, 2002. Lisa Richwine for Reuters. U.S. Nonprofit Gets Rights to Chagas Drug from Celera.