A non-profit offshoot of famed Nobel Prize winning Médecins sans Frontières is joining hands with pharmaceutical companies, government agencies and private donors in a new assault on neglected diseases.
Those hard-to-treat diseases include leishmaniasis, sleeping sickness, and Chagas disease.
These conditions infect millions of people worldwide each year, killing thousands. An article on this development is scheduled for the April 20 issue of Chemical & Engineering News, ACS' weekly newsmagazine.
C&EN senior editor Rick Mullin explains that just a decade ago major pharmaceutical companies devoted little attention to developing treatments for these diseases — thus the term, "neglected" diseases. That situation, however, has changed, with a nonprofit organization called Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative (DNDi) leading the way. DNDi hopes to have at least 6 new drugs for neglected diseases by 2014.
DNDi already has raised $150 million from public and private donors and seeks an additional $200 million by 2014. That cash, combined with a new commitment among pharmaceutical companies, brightens hopes for improving health and saving lives in the developing world, the article suggests.
By American Chemical Society
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