Global Fund to Help Buy Malaria Drugs

January 22, 2007

“A global fund is being created to subsidize the purchase of a new generation of anti-malaria drugs for Africa, where the mosquito-borne disease kills 1 million people a year, mostly children under 5, a World Bank-sponsored forum announced Friday.

The two-day conference of 80 health experts, African government ministers and nongovernmental organizations was called to build on a 2004 report by Nobel economics laureate Kenneth Arrow on how to make the new drugs affordable to the world's poorest and most vulnerable people.… The conference began the task of building a network of donor countries, led by the Netherlands, and of setting up the architecture for administering the fund. Drugs would be distributed by government health programs and by local stores, where most people now buy their medicines. Initial estimates say the fund will need about $80-100 million in the first year, building up to about $250 million per year in subsequent years, said Andreas Seiter, the World Bank official heading up the project.

Buyers would place orders directly with pharmaceutical companies, but would be billed for only a fraction of the cost. The manufacturers would invoice the global fund for the remaining amount, Seiter said, bringing down the cost to the consumers to roughly what they pay now for chloroquine. Seiter said he expected the structure of the fund to be completed this year, with the first subsidized drugs finding their way to village stores in the first half of 2008. Olusoji Adeyi, the World Bank's coordinator of public health programs, said it took 18 months of discussions to reach a broad agreement on the need for the subsidy. The plan will work in tandem with the Bank's malaria-prevention programs to provide mosquito nets and insecticide to affected areas. …” [The Associated Press (01/19)/Factiva]

“… It was decided on Friday that The Netherlands will take the lead to convince other countries to support the subsidy system. … Trouw notes that cheap medicine against malaria such as chloroquine - which were developed in the 1950s - are still widely used. But in large parts of the world, chloroquine cannot be used anymore because of the emergence of resistance to the drug. The alternative is a combination of artemisinine substances, or ACT. But ACT is for most malaria patients unaffordable. ‘We expect to provide $80 to $100 million in the first year, increasing to $250 million annually in the following years,’ noted Seiter. …” [Trouw (The Netherlands (01/20)]

Meanwhile, Volkskrant writes that according to the World Bank’s Adeyi “… ‘Malaria pills are only part of the solution. We have to prevent people getting malaria by investing in bed nets and insecticides that kill the malaria mosquito.’ …” [Volkskrant (The Netherlands, 01/20)]

“… Delegates hope that a malaria global subsidy organization can be announced by the end of the year, Dutch foreign ministry spokesman Rob de Vos said. … The World Bank estimates that the global fund for malaria could help deliver up to 350 million treatments a year at a cost of $250 million. Funding for the plan is being sought from national governments and other organizations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the international drug purchase facility UNITAID, he added. Nigerian Health Minister Eyitayo Lambo, whose country is hard hit by malaria, was enthusiastic about the proposal. …” [Agence France Presse (01/19)/Factiva]

Source: World Bank