[Ip-health] Pharmabiz: WHO executive board meet on Jan 18 to focus on funding research for neglected diseases

[Malini Aisola]

http://www.pharmabiz.com/article/detnews.asp?articleid=3D53573&sectionid=3D=
&z=3Dy

WHO executive board meet on Jan 18 to focus on funding research for
neglected diseases

Monday, January 18, 2010
Joseph Alexander, New Delhi

The Executive Board of the World Health Organisation is meeting next
week amid apprehensions that it would re-open the IMPACT-sponsored
anti-counterfeit medicines issue, along with the scheduled agenda of
discussing topics of financing to research for neglected diseases,
regulatory harmonization and pandemic influenza.

As the board meets from January 18 in the run-up to the world health
assembly scheduled in May, what can cause concern to countries like
India mainly is the anti-counterfeit issue though it is not on official
agenda. It is learnt that a new report on counterfeit medicines is
likely to be presented in the meeting. At the last executive meeting,
the report by the International Medical Products Anti-Counterfeiting
Task Force (IMPACT) had become controversial and finally the attempt to
redefine the counterfeit was aborted, mainly because of strong
resistance from countries like India and Brazil.

The official agenda of the meeting is to discuss mainly the ways to fund
research of drugs for neglected disease based on the report of an expert
working group. The working group has suggested many proposals to find
finances for the research. The public interest groups have already
raised concerns about the proposals also which they claimed to be in
line with the thinking of big pharmaceutical companies. India will also
be keenly watching on the fate of some of the proposals.

According to the expert group report, there is a need for new donor
funds for health research. =E2=80=9CThis mechanism considers three main sou=
rces
of funding: additional funding from new donors, non traditional donors,
who are not currently included in OECD=E2=80=99s Development Assistance
Committee (DAC), such as China, India and Venezuela; additional funding
from existing DAC donors (for example, earmarking a percentage of GDP
for health research and development); and additional funding from
philanthropic organizations,=E2=80=9D the report said.

A new indirect tax and voluntary contributions are also among the main
proposals for financing the research. The expert group was asked to
suggest innovative sources for financing the research as at present only
very little was spent on developing drugs for neglected diseases.



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Malini Aisola
Knowledge Ecology International
1621 Connecticut Avenue NW, Suite 500, Washington DC 20009
malini.aisola@keionline.org|Tel: +1.202.332.2670|Fax: +1.202.332.2673