A Lesson on Sharing
07/27/2010
Head GSK's Medicines Development Campus on finding new ways to work with others on diseases of the developing world
Research and development (R&D) for neglected diseases can significantly change the public health equation for the world's poorest countries. However, global research for diseases of the developing world is still too fragmented and we continue to need a much greater critical mass and more partnerships between the public and private sectors to take on crucial global public health challenges.
Take malaria, for example. The disease takes a devastating toll on communities and economies across Africa. The battle against malaria must be fought on all fronts using a wide range of interventions, including insecticide-treated bed nets, indoor residual spraying, effective medicines and treatments, and eventually, a vaccine - a core component of the malaria R&D agenda.
R&D can help address these challenges and industry must play its part in tackling these kinds of global health problems. Given the scale of the task we all face, particularly in malaria, we must find new ways for industry, academia, NGOs and governments to work together on global health R&D.
Critical to the success of driving R&D forward will be the close collaboration with organizations at the local, regional and international levels to ensure that health innovations complement existing interventions in the field of malaria. We all need to be willing to take more risks and be active participants in finding solutions to meeting the medical needs of the poor.
For many years, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has been working, often in partnership with the global community, to contribute to the achievement of MDG 6 and striving to combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases that disproportionally affect the developing world.
More recently, the elements of GSK's efforts to overcome fragmentation are guided by its philosophy of "open innovation," and they entail opening R&D centers to outside scientists, sharing compound libraries for researchers to pursue and working to ensure that people everywhere have access to new drugs and vaccines.
When I joined the 120 scientists at the company's collaborative research center in Tres Cantos, Spain in 2009, the team had just been charged with working more openly and in new ways to stimulate the search for medicines to fight diseases of the developing world, including the group of 16 neglected tropical diseases.
Here, drug discovery projects are prioritized primarily by their socio-economic and public health benefits, rather than by their commercial returns. The scientists embraced the challenge and in the spirit of collaboration, they began seeking the views of others to see how we could be more open. What they heard was a lesson familiar to all of us from a young age - share.
In May of this year, we saw our first milestone in this new direction, with the release of data identifying more than 13,500 promising potential leads to develop new medicines to treat malaria and publishing them - free of charge - on publicly accessible websites. The research comes from the rigorous screening of more than 2 million compounds in GSK's chemical library to seek out those that could inhibit the parasite P. falciparum, the most deadly strain of malaria.
The team who carried out this work are truly inspiring. It took them more than a year, and much of the hours were squeezed into their days around ongoing projects. All the work had to be done by hand in claustrophobic bio-safety conditions because of the potential for infection. Individually, one chemical at a time from that 2 million-strong collection was dispensed into one of the 384 wells on a block of plastic measuring about 10cm by 8cm. The team went through thousands of these plates until they had tested every compound to see if it could stop the malaria parasite from growing. By putting the ‘hits' from our screens into the public domain, we hope to stimulate new ideas and approaches that could lead to better treatments.
But posting these data online is not a silver bullet that can change the landscape for neglected diseases. Fortunately, there are many new initiatives and movements to help spur research and development for tuberculosis, malaria and other diseases of the developing world.
We realize that one size doesn't fit all. What GSK is best able to do, may not be what another company or organization is able to do to sustain its business model. The point is not to do the same thing but to do something to encourage innovative research, always with patients in mind.
With others in the global public health community, we can meet the health ‘research gap' challenge head-on. It is our responsibility to create and effectively deliver products of value to all patients throughout the world.
Adopting an open innovation approach for diseases of the developing world will foster and facilitate more R&D for neglected tropical diseases. We are evolving, becoming more open and finding new ways of working with others. We invite others to join us.
Dr. Nick Cammack is head of the Medicines Development Campus for Diseases of the Developing World at GlaxoSmithKline.
-
Post a Comment
