Thirteen drug companies, the governments of the United States, Britain and the United Arab Emirates, the World Bank, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Lions Club and other smaller charitable organizations on Monday announced a joint effort to tackle 10 neglected tropical diseases in a coordinated fashion.
The diseases, with multisyllabic names like lymphatic filariasis, visceral leishmaniasis and dracunculiasis, are almost never found in rich countries. Most are usually not fatal — but they still ruin the lives of subsistence farmers and rural craftsmen by causing blindness, grotesque swelling, chronic anemia, excruciating pain or other symptoms.
Although the diseases have different causes (like worms, flukes or parasites) and are spread by different vectors (like sandflies, tsetse flies or drinking water), some drugs that work against one will work against others. Leprosy, which is caused by bacteria, was one of the 10 diseases.
Some of these drugs lack markets in rich countries and so must be subsidized — although there are, for example, large sales of deworming drugs for pets and farm animals.
In an announcement at the Royal College of Physicians in London, the partners made various pledges; some drug companies increased the amounts of their donations, while others agreed to let their “libraries” of compounds be screened for new uses against tropical diseases. Margaret Chan, above right, director of the World Health Organization, and Bill Gates were among those at the news conference.
The governments and foundations pledged $785 million toward fighting the diseases, but some of that was reiteration of pledges made in the past.
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