Pipedream to (Clinical) Pipeline

After months of preparation, we were pleased to unveil CGD’s newest report, Safer, Faster, Cheaper: Improving Clinical Trials and Regulatory Pathways to Fight Neglected Diseases. The report launch featured a keynote address from FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg followed by a panel discussion of several working group members. Dr. Hamburg noted that neglected tropical diseases disproportionally affect the poorest, youngest and most politically marginalized -- undermining communities and ultimately depressing the global economy. She suggested that the solutions proposed in the working group’s report might help with the key challenges of conducting trials in disease endemic areas: namely (i) keeping trials safe and effective, (ii) practicing sound science, and (iii) finding sustainable resources. See the report brief here.

The New Bottom Billion and Global Health

As average income grows rapidly around the world, more and more of the world’s poor find themselves in middle-income countries (MIC). Similarly, as countries graduate into the middle income range, they bring with them the majority of global disease burden. Despite this shift, global health funders focus the majority of their resources -- and perhaps more importantly, their attention- on low-income countries. A new working paper by CGD’s Amanda Glassman, Denizhan Duran and Andy Sumner addresses the implications of this “new bottom billion” for global health goals. The paper recommends a new approach to addressing global health issues in MIC, by establishing regional pooled procurement mechanisms, building priority-setting institutions and accountability mechanisms, and eliminating the country income threshold as an across-the-board criterion for funding eligibility. See Amanda and Andy’s other work on the new bottom billion here, here, and here. Image: University of California, Berkeley

Achieving an AIDS Transition

The number of people on antiretroviral treatment has increased 16 times over since 2003, but 10 million people still lack needed access to HIV treatment. Mead Over addresses how policy makers and practitioners should incorporate prevention, treatment, and sustainability into a single goal in his new book, Achieving an AIDS Transition: Preventing Infections to Sustain Treatment (order the book online here). Reviewed by Paul Farmer and others, this book proposes a feasible medium-term objective for AIDS policy: achieving an AIDS transition -- that is, keeping AIDS deaths down by sustaining AIDS treatment while pushing new infections even lower via prevention. To accomplish this, Mead suggests a new, incentive-driven strategy to scale up HIV prevention and a sustained effort to get the most from AIDS treatment. Join us for the book launch event, featuring a panel discussion with speakers Ken Leonard (University of Maryland), Laurie Garrett (Council on Foreign Relations) and Jimmy Kolker (Former Chief of HIV/AIDS section at UNICEF) and David Wilson (World Bank) on November 16th, RSVP for the event here
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