In the News

2009 Year in Review

January 13, 2010

2009 was a tremendous year here at the Sabin Vaccine Institute as we strove to fulfill our mission of reducing human suffering caused by infectious and neglected tropical diseases (NTDs).

From the launch of the first-ever World Pneumonia Day, to securing increased US funding for the control and elimination of NTDs, to the start of the GLP toxicology study for the Na-GST-1 Hookworm Vaccine, to the mobilization of scores of African and Asian leaders for sustainable immunization financing, collectively, the Institute led a large number of efforts to address the burden of hundreds of millions of the world’s poorest individuals suffering from treatable and preventable diseases.

In 2009, the Sustainable Immunization Financing (SIF) Program brought together Ministers of Health, Ministers of Finance, and parliamentarians in eight countries to identify solutions to immunization financing challenges. After a briefing in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo), where attendees learned that the DR Congo was the only Central African nation in arrears to GAVI and was at risk of being suspended from the program, the DR Congo government released a partial payment of $511,000 in dues to GAVI with the remaining balance of $819,000 due to be paid by year’s end. The briefing prompted members of agencies and committees that do not often interact to meet and form partnerships to improve the health of their constituents through immunization.

SIF was not the only Sabin initiative using innovative techniques to address global health concerns. Sabin Vaccine Development’s Human Hookworm Vaccine Initiative (HHVI)—the world’s only Product Development Partnership (PDP) with a mission to develop a vaccine that may mediate hookworm infection—manufactured two lots of the Na-GST-1 Hookworm Vaccine at the Aeras Global TB Vaccine Foundation in Rockville, Maryland, for toxicological and clinical use. The successful manufacture of the Na-GST-1 hookworm vaccine was an important step towards the eventual creation of a bivalent vaccine candidate for hookworm, a disease with an at-risk population of up to 3.2 billion people. Clinical trials for this promising candidate are scheduled to begin in Brazil in mid-2010.

At the same time, Sabin Vaccine Development’s Schistosomiasis Vaccine Initiative (SVI) – the schistosomiasis vaccine program jointly funded by Morton Hyman and the Blavatnik Charitable Foundation – advanced towards manufacture in Latin America. SVI met with collaborator Instituto Butantan (IB) in São Paulo, Brazil to discuss the Sm-TSP-2 schistosomiasis vaccine candidate. SVI and IB will use IB’s cGMP pilot facility in São Paulo for the manufacture of Sm-TSP-2 for clinical trials. Brazil has the world's second largest number of endemic schistosomiasis cases and currently manufactures more than 80% of its own vaccines, making IB a key production partner for a schistosomiasis vaccine. The necessary requirements have been put in place to ensure an expedient technology transfer and execution of the manufacturing process in 2010.

In January 2009, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced a $34 million grant to the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases designed to leverage $200 million through regional financial mechanisms to treat no less than 230 million people with NTDs over five years. The Global Network forged partnerships with a number of public and private organizations over the last year to support End the Neglect 2020—an international campaign to raise public awareness and support to control and eliminate some of the most devastating and deadly NTDs by 2020—including Accenture, the Asian Development Bank, the Brazilian National Soccer Team, GlaxoSmithKline, Miss Universe Organization, Partners for Philanthropic Change, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), amongst others.

In addition, the Global Network made significant progress in the development of a regional “hub” financing mechanism and announced a significant commitment with partners at the Clinton Global Initiative to mobilize $30 million to fight NTDs in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Actress, philanthropist and Global Network Ambassador Alyssa Milano continued to advocate on behalf of the Global Network by supporting grassroots efforts and donating $100,000 to allow the African Program for Onchocerciasis Control (APOC) to purchase up to 1,000 bicycles for Community Drug Distributors in Tanzania and Liberia. Global Network Ambassador Tommy Thompson, former Secretary of Health and Human Services and four-term Governor of Wisconsin, visited Tanzania with former US Ambassador to Tanzania Mark Green to reinforce his commitment to integrate NTD and malaria treatment efforts. Secretary Thompson also participated in two think tank/academic briefings facilitated by the Global Network, and continued to lend his voice to help educate policymakers on our behalf.

Dr. Andy Baldwin, physician, humanitarian and television star, became the Global Network’s new Grassroots Ambassador and kicked off the Campus Challenge on November 2. Sixteen universities are currently engaged in the Campus Challenge contest, which provides an opportunity for full-time college students to become Student Ambassadors in the fight to prevent and eliminate NTDs. In the policy arena, the Global Network’s activities helped to expand the Congressional Malaria Caucus to include NTD control, a step that helped pave the way for increased appropriations to combat NTDs in FY 2010.

The Pneumococcal Awareness Council of Experts (PACE) continued to actively advocate for the prevention of pneumococcal disease. In 2009, 10 new countries introduced pneumococcal conjugate vaccine into their national immunization programs with Rwanda being the first low-income country to introduce the vaccine into its routine immunization program. Around the world, PACE and its members educated diverse groups—including members of the European parliament, national health leaders, and the at-risk community—about pneumococcal disease prevention.

In Dhaka, Bangladesh, PACE, along with Child Health Research Foundation (CHRF); Bangladesh Paediatric Association (BPA); Bangladesh Society for Paediatric Infectious Diseases (BSPID); Dhaka Shishu Hospital; ICDDR,B; and Save the Children in Bangladesh led a series of events to coincide with the first annual World Pneumonia Day, raising awareness amongst the Bangladeshi population on the burden of pneumonia, killer of an estimated 2 million children under the age of five each year, and of which pneumococcal disease is a leading cause. In 2009, the PACE Call to Action grew to include a total of 117 partners. PACE also released and finalized the results of two studies on long-term sequelae and mortality due to bacterial meningitis and pneumococcal infections in persons with sickle cell disease at the 4th Regional Pneumococcal Symposium in Johannesburg, South Africa. Both studies helped highlight the need for prevention of pneumococcal disease in Africa by quantifying the associated risks.

I’ve only touched the tip of the iceberg when it comes to discussing the work of the Institute last year but I hope that you’ll be enticed to continue to follow our exciting work and to find a way to become involved in our efforts to develop treatments and vaccines for the world’s poor and establish networks to ensure that these treatments are effectively and efficiently delivered.

Peter Hotez, MD PhD