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Gates Foundation May Help Fund Bird-Flu Vaccines
LONDON, July 12 - The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is considering ways of funding pandemic bird-flu vaccination in poor countries to ensure access for populations most at risk.
Tachi Yamada, head of health at the mega charity set up by the Microsoft chairman, said the foundation wanted to become involved since 95% of deaths from any flu pandemic were likely to be in the developing world.
"This is, potentially, one of the world's greatest inequities and as a result we are focusing a fair amount of attention on it," he said in an interview during a visit to London.
"We don't have a specific grant programme yet but what we've done is used our convening capabilities to ensure that a dialogue takes place and I think significant progress has been made over the past couple of months."
Discussions to date have involved vaccine manufacturers, healthcare regulators and the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Scientists say the H5N1 virus found in bird populations in Asia, Europe and Africa is the most likely source of the next global flu pandemic in humans, since it may soon mutate into a form that is transmitted easily from person to person.
Several companies are working on vaccines against H5N1 but there are fears that price and limited production capacity could mean rich countries grab supplies, leaving the world's poor with no protection.
Some companies, including GlaxoSmithKline Plc, where Yamada used to be research head, plan to donate a certain amount of vaccine to a WHO stockpile for poor countries and have also offered to discount prices in the developing world.
But Yamada believes there will still be a need for additional financial assistance. "We're looking very carefully at what kind of funding mechanism could be established to pay for the vaccines, even at the lower price," he said.
It may be the world's largest charity but even the Gates Foundation, with a health budget of around $2 billion a year, will not be able to bridge the gap on its own. It could, however, play a supportive role, alongside groups such as the GAVI Alliance, a nonprofit vaccines group established in 2000.
Buying enough vaccine for half the world's population would cost some $6 billion, if the price was kept to $2, which is around a quarter of the price charged for conventional seasonal flu shots.
Existing worldwide manufacturing capacity for seasonal flu vaccines, which contain three virus strains, is sufficient to treat around 600 million people a year.
Yamada said he hoped this might be stretched to as much as 3.6 billion in the event of a pandemic, by using additives, or adjuvants, that would reduce the amount of antigen needed in each shot. A pandemic vaccine would also likely contain only one strain, which would also help supplies go further.
By: Ben Hirschler |
