Novartis announces $250 million to the fight against NTDs
Novartis endorses the Kigali Declaration on neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) and announces a five-year financial commitment of USD 250 million to the fight against NTDs and malaria in conjunction with the Kigali Summit on Malaria and NTDs alongside the 26th Commonwealth Heads of Government (CHOGM) meeting. This summit comes at a pivotal time for world leaders to reaffirm commitments to end neglected tropical diseases and malaria through the adoption of the Kigali Declaration. The declaration aims to mobilize political will and secure commitments to achieve the SDG3 target on NTDs and to deliver the targets set out in the World Health Organization’s Neglected Tropical Disease Roadmap (2021-2030).
“Over the past decade, great progress has been made against NTDs, but there is still a lot more work to be done. Novartis will continue progressing our longstanding commitment to helping realize a world free of NTDs,” said Vas Narasimhan, CEO of Novartis. “Today, by endorsing the Kigali Declaration and pledging to invest USD 250 million, we aim to accelerate progress toward elimination of these diseases, which continue to cause suffering and stigma for millions of people around the globe.”
Novartis was among the original endorsers of the London Declaration on NTDs in 2012, committing to a multidrug therapy (MDT) donation to support global efforts to eliminate leprosy. This was followed with a commitment of USD 100 million toward the fight against malaria at the Malaria Summit in London in 2018. By endorsing the Kigali Declaration today, Novartis reaffirms its commitment to the fight against NTDs and malaria.
As part of the commitment over five years (2021-2025), Novartis will invest USD 250 million to advance research and development (R&D) of new treatments to combat NTDs and malaria.
This includes USD 100 million to advance R&D of its neglected tropical disease program, focusing on novel drug candidates for four diseases. In collaboration with Wellcome, the Novartis Institute for Tropical Diseases (NITD) is working to discover novel, curative anti- parasitic therapies for Chagas disease. Further, we are collaborating with the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative (DNDi), with earlier support from Wellcome, to jointly develop LXE408 for the treatment of visceral leishmaniasis, and are currently entering Phase II clinical development. We also made progress on a potential first-in-class compound to treat dengue fever, which is currently in Phase I clinical trial. Although this is the most common vector-borne viral disease in the world, there is currently no specific treatment for dengue. Cryptosporidium infection is the most prevalent form of parasitic diarrhea, a major cause of mortality among young children in developing countries. The NITD has discovered a promising drug candidate, EDI048, currently in Phase I clinical development.
With regards to malaria, Novartis commits to investing USD 150 million to advance the clinical development programs of its three novel drug candidates to combat the emerging resistance to artemisinin. The company will also continue with activities to support the development of an optimized formulation for neonates and infants under 5kg, for whom no treatment currently exists.
Around the world, 1.7 billion people suffer from NTDs, which are prevalent in tropical areas and mostly affect impoverished communities, causing devastating health, social and economic consequences. The NITD was established in 2001 within the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research (NIBR) to apply modern drug discovery technologies to finding new therapeutics for NTDs and malaria.
Novartis has been committed to the fight against malaria for more than 20 years and to date, working with partners, the company has delivered more than 1 billion treatments, including more than 450 million pediatric treatments, without profit to malaria-endemic countries. According to the 2021 World Malaria Report, there were 241 million cases of malaria and
627,000 malaria deaths in 2020. Children under 5 are particularly at risk, and malaria takes the life of a child every minute in Africa.
Blackout rocks operation of 30 farms
One of the major hard currency earning sectors, the horticulture sector, gets a setback after occurrence of a power outage in the horticultural hub that stretches from Bishoftu to Qoqa.
Sources within the sector informed Capital that the main line that feeds power to the horticulture industries in the area was interrupted as from end of last week, “This has presented a myriad of challenges to our farms.”
The Ethiopian Horticulture Producer and Exporters Association (EHPEA) also confirmed the problem which its members are facing in the area.
Yemisrach Berhanu, Promotion and Information Service Head at EHPEA, said that the power interruption occurred for about six days until Thursday June 30.
“Because of the blackout, 30 farms have been affected. On the other end, the Ethiopian Electric Utility (EEU), which is responsible for distributing power, has informed us that the power outage transpired because of a particular theft that happened on a transmission line, but we were unable to know when it would be resolved,” she told Capital.
According to Yemisrach, operations like managing the green house activity, irrigation or feeding plants and operating the cooling houses have been affected at the farms.
She said that farms attempted to manage the problem by sourcing power from generators; however the shortage of diesel has added salt to injury, in addition to the continuous blackout.
The horticulture investment that manages over 200, 000 laborers, mostly women, with very limited plots of land is highly concentrated on the Qoqa area and on the highway to Batu town, south of Qoqa, which is 91 km south east of Addis Ababa. The export of products from the area also dominates the sector earnings.
The information that Capital secured from the electric provider indicated that the power line that came from Qoqa Station, one of the oldest energy dam, was damaged because of theft.
However, the Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP), which is responsible for administering generation, high tension lines including national grids and bulk power sales, said that the transmission line around Mojo area had been damaged two weeks ago.
“Nevertheless, we have managed the problem within two days and now the line is operating properly,” Moges Mekonnen, Public relation head of EEP, told Capital.
He said that the problem that rose from horticulture farms is not related with EEP.
“Concerning the power supply, the problem which transpired a fort night ago was solved immediately. I have also learnt that the power supply has been interrupted for the farms but since they are not our clients, and adding to the fact that after the two day blackout with the power being put back on, I do not see the areas where we could come in to assist,” he elaborated.
However information from EEU, which has direct relations with farms, disclosed the power cut is related with a transmission line cut that is managed by EEP.
“Because of the situation, now the plantation and other activities at the farms are affected,” she added by requesting swift solution from the relevant government offices.
The horticulture industry has contributed over half a billion dollars in the first ten months of the 2021/22 budget year, making the sector the third major hard currency source after coffee and gold.
The hard currency generation from the sector is growing every year despite different challenges including the recent effect related with COVID 19.
