April 03, 2025 07:52 am (IST)

Make this your homepage

Health

In a major boost for tourism, Shimla to get Asia's longest ropeway spanning 13.79 kilometers | Karnataka govt hikes sales tax on diesel, price goes up by Rs. 2 | 'Heard India will be dropping its tariffs substantially': Donald Trump ahead of announcing reciprocal tariff | Opposition MPs decide to vote against Waqf Amendment Bill in Parliament tomorrow | Chilean President Boric visits India, discusses ways to expand bilateral ties with Modi | Himanta Biswa Sarma slams Muhammad Yunus' Northeast remarks, Tripura leader suggests Bangladesh's split | Modi govt determined to uproot Naxalism by March 31, 2026: Amit Shah | Time for reciprocity: White House refers to India's 100 percent tariff imposed on US agri products ahead of April 2 deadline | Fresh encounter breaks out in J&K's Kathua, security forces trap 3 terrorists | Pakistani advocacy group nominates Imran Khan for Nobel Peace Prize

Photo: WIPO/Emmanuel Berrod

UN boosts knowledge-sharing to combat diseases

India Blooms News Service | | Apr 25, 2014, at 04:59 pm

#United Nations # tropical diseases # tuberculosis # Malaria # medical innovations

New York, Apr 25 (IBNS): Announcing that more than 50 partners are now on board its partnership initiative to fight against neglected tropical diseases, tuberculosis and malaria, the United Nations intellectual property agency on Thursday hailed the watershed achievement as a significant step towards helping more than one billion people overcome such maladies.

“WIPO [World Intellectual Property Organization] Re:Search and its partners are expanding their efforts to drive new medical innovations that will help millions of people around the world,” said Francis Gurry, WIPO Director General.

He added that “barely two years old, WIPO Re:Search is finding new ways to use intellectual property in the fight against some of the world’s most persistent, and neglected ailments.”

With Re:Search, WIPO and its Seattle-based partner BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH), connect holders of intellectual property and other resources, such as pharmaceutical compounds, data and discovery techniques, with qualified researchers working on new treatments for neglected tropical diseases such as leprosy, river blindness and rabies, as well as malaria and tuberculosis.

Under the agreements, these resources are complimentary. To date, over 50 partnerships have been established, highlighting the programme’s rising influence in the public-health sector.

Underlining that partnership is the backbone for these effective coordinated efforts, Jennifer Dent, President of BVGH, also stressed the importance of a strong commitment and desire to share compounds and knowledge to help advance research and development for neglected diseases.

“Through these collaborations, WIPO Re:Search will make a difference in the lives of people living in endemic countries and that is the ultimate goal of consortia members,” Dent added.

While the 50th partner, GlaxoSmithKline plc, will provide researchers at India’s National Institute of Immunology with its Published Kinase Inhibitor Set 1 (PKIS1) to better understand liver-stage malaria parasites, two other new collaborators, Sanofi SA, and Pfizer Inc., will share compounds with researchers at Saint Louis University in the US to develop new anti-diarrheal treatments.

Moreover, WIPO Re:Search, with Australia’s financial support, has also arranged sabbaticals for African biomedical researchers to work in some of the world’s leading research facilities, such as Novartis AG in Switzerland, and Stanford University and the University of California San Francisco in the US.

Launched in 2011, WIPO Re:Search and BVGH have built a new consortium through which public and private sectors worldwide are making valuable intellectual property available to help develop diagnostics, treatments and vaccines for neglected tropical diseases that are most prevalent in developing countries. The programme is structured around three main areas of activity: global database, partnership hub, and supporting services.

(WIPO Director General Francis Gurry. Photo: WIPO/Emmanuel Berrod)

Support Our Journalism

We cannot do without you.. your contribution supports unbiased journalism

IBNS is not driven by any ism- not wokeism, not racism, not skewed secularism, not hyper right-wing or left liberal ideals, nor by any hardline religious beliefs or hyper nationalism. We want to serve you good old objective news, as they are. We do not judge or preach. We let people decide for themselves. We only try to present factual and well-sourced news.

Support objective journalism for a small contribution.

India
International

Related Images

West Bengal government airlifts ailing Gangasagar pilgrims to Kolkata Jan 13, 2025, at 12:45 pm

Cyclone Dana: Heavy rains lash Kolkata, widespread waterlogging reported from several areas Oct 25, 2024, at 11:15 pm

Farmers working at dragon fruit garden in Agaratala Jun 30, 2021, at 05:07 am