AstraZeneca remains committed to making a contribution to improving healthcare in the developing world, but we believe that real progress can only be made through the commitment of all the related stakeholders, including governments, NGOs and the international community, as well as the private sector. Only by working together can sustainable improvements be achieved.
The medicines in AstraZeneca's range today are not relevant to the treatment of HIV, TB and malaria, the most significant healthcare problems that the developing world is currently facing, but we are applying our skills and resources to helping in other ways. Our approach is two-fold.
We have a dedicated research facility in Bangalore, India that is focused on finding a new, improved treatment for TB that will act on drug-resistant strains, simplify the treatment regime (current regimes are complex and lengthy, meaning many patients give up before the infection is fully treated) and be compatible with HIV/AIDS therapies (TB and HIV/AIDS form a lethal combination, each speeding the other’s progress).
As well as the availability of appropriate medicines, access to healthcare depends on having a functional healthcare system, trained healthcare staff and effective supply and distribution mechanisms in place to ensure that medicines are used to their full effect as part of overall healthcare management. In some parts of the developing world, this is a particular challenge. To help the most vulnerable people to meet this challenge, we partner with NGOs and other organisations working with local communities to strengthen their frameworks for managing healthcare in a sustainable way. In particular, we focus on community-based projects that can be scaled up and potentially replicated in other disease areas to improve outcomes for the greatest number of people. | SOME FACTS ABOUT TB1 |  | TB has been with us since ancient times, but is successfully adapting to the modern world. | | | Every day TB claims 5,000 lives - more than ever before. | | | TB is contagious and spreads through the air; if not treated, each person with active TB infects on average 10 to 15 people every year. | | | Someone in the world is newly infected with TB bacilli every second. | | | Overall, one-third of the world's population is currently infected with the TB bacillus. | | | TB is a leading killer among HIV-infected people with weakened immune systems; about 200,000 people with HIV die from TB every year, most of them being in Africa. |
As part of our focus on TB, we actively engage in international efforts to help in the fight against this devastating disease.
We participate in the Stop TB Partnership for Europe, established by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies with the World Health Organization (WHO), European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control and other leading European agencies and NGOs to forge a more effective response to the TB epidemic in areas of Europe. The partnership aims to strengthen strategic impact by engaging a broad range of stakeholders, including private sector, foundations, academic and research institutions, media, NGOs and civil society.
In 2007, through our involvement with the Stop TB Partnership for Europe, we participated in “All Against Tuberculosis”, a WHO European Ministerial Forum, hosted by the German government,. The Forum's purpose was to accelerate progress towards achieving the global targets for TB control in the WHO European Region and Target 8 of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goal 6: "to have halted and begun to reverse the incidence of TB by 2015." Over 300 delegates at the Forum adopted the Berlin Declaration on Tuberculosis, which describes the disease as "an increasing threat to health security in the WHO European Region". The Declaration calls for urgent action to halt and reverse the high levels of TB, including its multidrug-resistant (MDR) and extensively drug-resistant (XDR) strains. In the Declaration, Member States and international partners, including AstraZeneca, commit themselves to providing more support and resources to control and eventually eliminate the disease.
AstraZeneca is the only major pharmaceutical company involved in the New Medicines for TB (NM4TB) project, begun in 2006. Funded by a grant from the EU Framework VI programme and consisting of around fifteen groups of Europe’s most prominent scientists and researchers in the field, this consortium seeks to combine academic and pharmaceutical skills to further the discovery of new therapies for TB.
In 2006, we helped fund and participated in the second Open Forum on Key Issues in TB Drug Development, organised by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development (TB Alliance), Treatment Action Group (TAG), and the Stop TB Partnership Working Group on New Drugs. The workshop involved representatives from industry, academia and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and focused on key issues in the critical path to TB drug registration and pivotal trials as well as the challenges in TB drug development for special populations, including people living with HIV/AIDS.
In some quarters, the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals for Health have been characterised in human rights’ terms as a ‘Right to Health’, with accountabilities allocated to both governments and pharmaceutical companies. We believe that in this context, it is governments who are accountable for providing a robust healthcare infrastructure for their populations – one that supports good public health and can ensure that medicines are delivered to those who need them. AstraZeneca nevertheless recognises that we have a part to play although our challenge is to shape the form of that contribution, given that our marketed medicines are not for treating the most significant healthcare problems in the developing world today. We continue to participate in national and international discussions on this issue, in which we explain that we believe the best way we can help to achieve the health-related Millennium Development Goals is through our TB research in Bangalore and from our initiatives aimed at strengthening local healthcare capabilities. The content of this page was externally assured by Bureau Veritas, February 2008 1Source: World Health Organisation |