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Interested in more global health innovation news? Every week GHTC scours media reports worldwide to deliver essential global health R&D news and content to your inbox. Sign-up now to receive our weekly R&D News Roundup email.On March 6, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced wide-ranging reforms in the organization’s structure intended to help it achieve its “triple billion” targets as part of its new five-year strategic plan—including one billion more people benefiting from universal health coverage, one billion more people better protected from health emergencies, and one billion more people enjoying better health and well-being. Among the reforms is the creation of a new chief scientist division formed “to strengthen WHO’s core scientific work and ensure the quality and consistency of WHO’s norms and standards.” Headed by Soumya Swaminathan who will serve as chief scientist, this division is also expected to offer and improve career opportunities for scientists at WHO. Other reforms include the creation of a new department of digital health, a division of emergency preparedness to complement WHO’s existing emergency response work, and a “WHO Academy” to train public health professionals. WHO officials have summed up the organizational transformation initiative as an effort to break down silos across WHO programs and ensure alignment among its offices worldwide. A new report released by the G20 Health & Development Partnership on March 5 urges finance ministers to help tackle some of the world’s most pressing global health challenges by developing new financing models and increasing concerted activity for research and development. The report calls for innovative solutions to funding health, citing that ill health could cost the world billions in treatment and lost economic productivity. Alan Donnelly, convener of the G20 Health & Development Partnership, stated that tackling these health challenges are “no longer just an issue for health ministers, it is now an issue for heads of government and for finance ministers because of the threat to the global economy as well as to humanity.” The partnership released the report in advance of the joint G20 health and finance ministers meeting in Japan in June as an appeal to the finance ministers to “remove the silo walls around health care.”For only the second time in history, a patient appears to have been cured of HIV. Like the first recorded case nearly 12 years ago, this outcome resulted from a bone marrow transplant initially intended to treat cancer. In both cases, transplants were from a donor with a mutation in a protein called CCR5, which rests on the surface of certain immune cells. The HIV virus uses this protein to enter those cells but cannot latch onto the mutated version. Although these transplants confirm for researchers that a cure for HIV is possible, bone marrow transplantation is unlikely to be a realistic treatment option in the near future due to the risk and harsh side effects involved—though rearming the body with immune cells modified to resist HIV may succeed as a practical treatment.

G20 health and finance ministers urged to bring about the necessary marriage between the wealth and the health of nations A global coalition of charities, businesses, product development partnerships and academics have come together to say the G20 is failing to meet today’s urgent health challenges and this will only be solved if heads of government and finance ministers take charge to stop this severe threat to the global economy as well as to humanity. The G20 Health and Development Partnership – representing 21 leading global organisations and more than 1000 collaborators – will today urge G20 heads of government and finance ministers to join health ministers in addressing the growing disease burden before it is too late. It is predicted that the number of deaths in the G20 countries from non-communicable diseases, such as cancer, heart diseases and diabetes will double by 2030 if urgent steps are not taken now. Together with the fact that tuberculosis still remains the number one killer globally, the rise of drug resistance amongst infectious diseases pose an existential threat to society. The report, which is being launched in the UK parliament today (Tuesday 5th March) calls on G20 heads of government and finance ministers to ‘take ownership’ of this issue similar to their efforts combatting climate change - rather than just leave it to health ministers. The economic consequences in low- and middle income countries of the increasing disease burden is unsustainable if not addressed. The partnership is presenting the report to the heads of government finance and health ministers in advance of the joint G20 health and finance ministers meeting in Japan this June. Lord Jim O’Neill, chair of the Royal Institute of International Affairs Chatham House London, said: “This report by the G20 Health and Development Partnership is an appeal to G20 finance ministers to remove the silo walls around health care to see what can be done to make a link between the health and the wealth of our nations. “It sets out to support the need to invest in human capital in terms of global health. It is a holistic approach that blends economics and health so that the wealth and the health of nations are united in a new priority for government, society and the economic actors in the rest of the century. “I would like the G20 health and finance ministers to bring about the necessary marriage between the wealth and the health of nations.” Alan Donnelly, Convener of the G20 Health and Development Partnership and Executive Chairman of Sovereign Sustainability and Development, said: “The richest nations of the world will miss their own health global goals unless governments recognise the existential nature of the threat, make it a priority for leaders, and develop new partnerships because government funding isn’t going to fix this alone. “This is no longer just an issue for health ministers, it is now an issue for heads of government and for finance ministers because of the threat to the global economy as well as to humanity. “The G20 Health and Development Partnership, which emerged during the course of the German presidency in 2017, works to ensure that G20 countries are coordinating their health innovation strategy to tackle the growing burden of communicable and non-communicable diseases globally. “This year the G20 can set in motion steps to examine new ways of funding innovation in health and encourage the establishment of mechanisms that will help to fund the diagnostics, vaccines and medicines that are so urgently required globally.”

Interested in more global health innovation news? Every week GHTC scours media reports worldwide to deliver essential global health R&D news and content to your inbox. Sign-up now to receive our weekly R&D News Roundup email. The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) is investing US$34 million into the German biotech company CureVac to develop vaccine “printing” technology that could rapidly manufacture vaccines to treat multiple diseases. Specifically, this funding will help CureVac work on a prototype of its RNA printer product, a transportable automated printing facility for molecules known as messenger RNA (mRNA)—used to transport genetic information from DNA into a cell, instructing it to produce a specific antigen to induce an immune response. As part of this three-year deal with CEPI, CureVac will use its mRNA platform to produce vaccines for Lassa fever, Rabies, and Yellow fever. If preclinical tests are successful, two of the vaccine candidates will be developed through early-stage safety trials in people. As epidemics of infectious diseases can be unpredictable and fast-moving, CureVac’s vaccine platform could help improve our ability to defend against such pathogens. Treating bednets with an antimalarial drug could be a promising new approach to controlling the disease. Although insecticide-treated bednets have been credited with averting 68 percent of all malaria cases since 2000, scientists believe mosquitoes are developing a resistance to pyrethroid, the insecticide predominantly used to treat bednets. Researchers at Harvard University demonstrated that an antimalarial drug can be transmitted to mosquitoes through brief direct contact and effectively halt the transmission of the malaria-causing parasite. In the study, researchers coated a petri dish with atovaquone, a commonly used antimalarial drug. Mosquitoes landed on the treated surface for approximately six minutes and were then fed a blood meal rife with the malaria parasite. Results showed that none of the mosquitoes treated with antimalarial drugs harbored the parasite and demonstrated proof of concept that antimalarial-treated bednets could be a powerful new tool in the fight against malaria. The US Food and Drug Administration has granted Fast Track designation to the Themis Bioscience chikungunya vaccine candidate, which allows the product to receive an expedited agency review given its potential to meet an unmet medical need. Themis hopes this designation will support its phase 3 development efforts for the vaccine, which showed encouraging results in phase 2. Two other chikungunya vaccine candidates have also received Fast Track designation, though the Themis vaccine is the most advanced in development. There are no current treatments or vaccines for chikungunya, a disease for which symptoms include debilitating joint pain.