Institutions of RICET
Carlos III Health Institute
Biological Research Centre
Ramon y Cajal Hospital
López Neyra Parasitology and Biomedicine Institute
Severa Ochoa Molecular Biology Centre, Autónoma University of Madrid
La Laguna University
Léon University
Murcia University
Salamanca University
Valencia University
BACKGROUND
Based on the excellent work of the initial Network, its organisation has been consolidated in this new stage: while keeping the same objectives, a Strategic Plan has been developed, along with a research plan based on thematic programmes. These are coordinated by outstanding researchers in each relevant area, where they monitor the scientific development in terms of scientific production, mobility and technology transfer.
RICET, coordinated from the start by the National Centre of Tropical Medicine, Carlos III Health Institute, is not only create as a research structure but it also advises national and international entities and institutions on neglected and imported tropical diseases. It also heads the field of technical assistance for the national programmes of low-income tropical countries, thanks to the wide-ranging collaborations of the participating research groups.
Therefore, RICET seeks to accommodate those emerging research groups that have a special interest in participating in the scientific programmes that it develops, in order to foster research in neglected and tropical pathologies and develop tools that may be useful to control them.
JUSTIFICATION
More relevant aspects of current research in tropical, neglected and poverty-linked infections:
Non-profit Product Development Partnerships (PDP), sometimes known as Public-Private Partnerships (PPP), have been set up to develop new drugs, diagnostic tests and vaccines for neglected diseases. These include the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative I (IAVI), Medicines for Malaria Venture II (MMV), Global Alliance for Tuberculosis Drug Development III (GATB), and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative IV (DNDi), co-founded by MSF. A recent report published by the London School of Economics on the new R&D panorama in the field of neglected diseases, based on the medicines currently being developed and assuming standard margins of error, estimates that the PDPs could provide the market with eight to nine new drugs in the next five years.
The Tropical Disease Cooperative Research Network (RICET) is the extension of Research Network of Centres for Tropical Medicine, set up in 2002. Relaunched in January 2007, after an exhaustive external evaluation, RICET has kept the majority of the research groups from the initial stage plus the inclusion of new groups that been incorporated through successive calls.
Based on the excellent work of the initial Network, its organisation has been consolidated in this new stage: while keeping the same objectives, a Strategic Plan has been developed, along with a research plan based on thematic programmes. These are coordinated by outstanding researchers in each relevant area, where they monitor the scientific development in terms of scientific production, mobility and technology transfer.
RICET, coordinated from the start by the National Centre of Tropical Medicine, Carlos III Health Institute, is not only create as a research structure but it also advises national and international entities and institutions on neglected and imported tropical diseases. It also heads the field of technical assistance for the national programmes of low-income tropical countries, thanks to the wide-ranging collaborations of the participating research groups.
Therefore, RICET seeks to accommodate those emerging research groups that have a special interest in participating in the scientific programmes that it develops, in order to foster research in neglected and tropical pathologies and develop tools that may be useful to control them.
JUSTIFICATION
More relevant aspects of current research in tropical, neglected and poverty-linked infections:
- The World Health Organisation report titled “Eliminating Barriers that Prevent Health Development” (WHO, 2005) begins by highlighting the vast increase in infectious diseases, which prevents progress being made in the areas of global health and life expectancy. Infections are currently the leading cause of youth and child mortality, with over 13 million deaths. One out of two occurs in developing countries. The main reasons leading to this increase in infection-associated mortality in developing countries is related to the harmful effects of globalisation: the gap has increased between northern and southern countries, where 1,300 million people live with a per capita income of under 1 euro per day; one out of three children is badly nourished; one out of five was not vaccinated during their first year of life and practically nearly all of those 1,300 million people do not have access to appropriate medicine. Nearly 90% of infection-associated mortality is caused by six diseases: pneumonia, tuberculosis, diarrhea processes, malaria, measles and AIDS.
- The WHO has coordinated a Tropical Disease Research Programme (TDR) over the last two decades. The diseases included are malaria, trypanosomiasis, leishmaniasis, schistosomosis, lymphatic filariasis, leprosy, tuberculosis and dengue. It is noteworthy that five of them are parasitary and that the prevalence, risk population, together with the relevant morbidity-mortality is very high
(*) Taken from Watkins B. Trends Parasitol 2003; 19: 477-478Trends in Parasitology worldwide (*) Parasitosis Risk Population (x106) No of cases (x106) Mortality (x106) Malaria 2.100 270-400 1.120 African trypanosomiasis 60 0,3-0,5 49 American trypanosomiasis 120 17 13 Leishmaniasis 350 12 57 Schistosomosis 600 >200 15 Onchocerciasis 120 18 0 Lymphatic filariasis 1.000 120 0 Intestinal protozoosis 3.500 450 65 Geohelminthiasis 4.500 3.000 17
- The European Union has organised a series of specific health research programmes in these diseases: The first was Science and Technology for Development (STD), followed by the Investing in Cooperation (INCO) programme that ended in 2002 with the V Framework Plan. The VI Framework Plan had a R&D priority line specifically entitled Poverty-linked Diseases. The VII Framework Programme then included an important Research and Cooperation section. Another programme called European Clinical Trials Platforms for Poverty-Related Diseases began in June 2003.
- Over the last two years, several international initiatives have stressed the need to increase research into tropical diseases. Special mention should be made of the following:
- The R&D Request launched, in June 2005, by the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative (DNDi) and others of its founding partners, Oxfam and the BIOS initiative, urged governments to head a new R&D model for neglected diseases. In just 10 months, over 5,000 scientists, politicians, companies and members of NGOs (including 19 Nobel Prize winners) signed the request.
- In 2005, the WHO Assembly also passed two resolutions that stressed the need for further work on controlling leishmaniasis and African human trypanosomiasis. During the World Health Assembly held in June 2006, two resolutions were discussed to develop a new R&D system in this context: “A Global Framework on Essential Health Research and Development” proposed by Kenya and Brazil, and the report of the WHO Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, Innovation and Public Health (CIPIH).
Non-profit Product Development Partnerships (PDP), sometimes known as Public-Private Partnerships (PPP), have been set up to develop new drugs, diagnostic tests and vaccines for neglected diseases. These include the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative I (IAVI), Medicines for Malaria Venture II (MMV), Global Alliance for Tuberculosis Drug Development III (GATB), and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative IV (DNDi), co-founded by MSF. A recent report published by the London School of Economics on the new R&D panorama in the field of neglected diseases, based on the medicines currently being developed and assuming standard margins of error, estimates that the PDPs could provide the market with eight to nine new drugs in the next five years.
