Reducing the impact of neglected tropical diseases - new collaboration aims to treat more than 40 million

new $100 million program launched to reduce their impact in developing nations - News Release

By Laura Gallagher
Monday 25 September 2006

A new collaborative program to reduce the impact of neglected tropical diseases in developing nations is launched this month. Imperial College London is one of the partners in the programme, which is funded by USAID and which aims to treat more than 40 million people annually for five years.

The project is one of the first large-scale efforts to integrate existing disease-specific treatment programmes that currently treat millions of the world's poorest people. In doing so, the project will build on the success of those programmes and enhance their effectiveness and efficiency by integrating treatment, monitoring and evaluation programmes.

Under the terms of the cooperative agreement, worth $100 million, US research organisation RTI will lead a team that includes the Schistosomiasis Control Initiative at Imperial College, the Sabin Vaccine Institute, Liverpool Associates in Tropical Health (LATH), and the International Trachoma Initiative.

The USAID-funded programme will focus on integrated control of seven of the most prevalent neglected tropical diseases -- trachoma (blinding eye infection), soil-transmitted helminths (hookworm, ascaris, trichuris), onchocerciasis (river blindness), schistosomiasis (snail fever) and lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis).

These particular diseases were chosen because they can be treated through large-scale integrated programmes using safe and effective drugs made available through public-private partnerships.

"Taken as a group, the neglected tropical diseases to be targeted have an impact on health equivalent to that of malaria," said Professor Alan Fenwick, from Imperial College's department of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and project director for RTI International.

"Because many of these tropical diseases occur in the same areas and affect the same populations, distributing safe treatments for them will be more effective and cost efficient and will help make a substantial contribution toward achieving the Millennium Development Goal of combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases."

While they have little name recognition in developed societies, neglected tropical diseases cause severe disabilities such as blindness, reduced mobility, impaired childhood growth and intellectual development, and severe disfigurements in developing nations. Along with several others, they are responsible for about 415,000 deaths annually worldwide and are among the leading causes of poverty in developing countries.

The project will target countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America that have a high prevalence of the targeted diseases and have recognized them as a national health priority.

Through the collaborative effort, RTI and its partners will work with the ministries of health and nongovernmental organisations in each country to develop treatment programs that best meet the needs of each country. As part of the project, RTI will establish an independent committee that will award and oversee grants to countries and organisations that will benefit from a mass treatment campaign.

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