An alliance of institutions collectively managing an estimated 80 percent of all public health research funding worldwide today announced their first targets for concerted action in the fight against "chronic non-communicable diseases" (CNCDs).
Lowering hypertension (high blood pressure), and reducing tobacco use and the indoor pollution caused by crude cooking stoves in developing countries -- which together contribute to about 1 in 5 deaths each year -- were chosen as initial priorities for the unprecedented coordinated research program under the recently-formed Global Alliance for Chronic Disease.
The priorities were set earlier this month in New Delhi, India, at the Alliance's inaugural scientific summit.
The Alliance was created last June to support clear and coordinated research funding priorities in the battle against CNCDs, namely:
· Cardiovascular diseases (mainly heart disease and stroke)
· Several cancers
· Chronic respiratory conditions, and
· Type 2 diabetes.
Three new members (the South African Medical Research Council, the Qatar Biomedical Research Institute, and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) of the US National Institutes of Health) were welcomed by the Alliance's six charter members:
· Australia National Health and Medical Research Council
· Canadian Institutes of Health Research
· Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences
· Indian Council of Medical Research
· U.K. Medical Research Council, and
· U.S. National Institutes of Health, specifically its National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), the Fogarty International Center, now joined by NIMH (the three NIH members sharing one vote on the Alliance board).
Welcomed also were three new partner organizations:
- Pan American Health Organization, Chronic Disease Prevention and Control Department
- World Heart Federation, and
- National Institute of Medical Research, Tanzania
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), which is represented on the Alliance Board by an official observer, 58 million deaths were recorded in 2006, some 60 percent of them caused by CNCDs -- twice as many deaths as the combined total of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, maternal and peri-natal conditions, and nutritional deficiencies.
The health impact and socio-economic cost of CNCDs is enormous and rising, upending efforts to combat poverty.
About 11.5 million deaths per year are attributed to hypertension, tobacco and indoor air pollution from cooking stoves, representing almost one-third of the 35 million deaths caused annually by CNCDs (please see appendix 1).
Alliance members also agreed in New Delhi to commission several scoping initiatives to prepare future joint research into obesity and diabetes, a process to be led by the Alliance's acting Executive Director, Prof. David Matthews of Oxford University.
The Alliance's multi-country, multi-disciplinary research will focus in particular on the needs of low and middle income countries, and on those of low income populations of more developed countries.
Collectively, Alliance members expect to invest tens of millions of dollars in their first coordinated research programmes over five years.
Members agreed that the research must, among other things:
· Involve local policymakers from the outset, with a commitment to scale up successfully tested programs
· Measure clinical outcomes - for example, a reduction in the incidence of stroke, not just a drop in the incidence of hypertension
· Ensure that human and other resources are not diverted from local health care systems