The Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND) and the World Health Organization (WHO), with a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will begin work on the development and evaluation of new diagnostic tests for human African trypanosomiasis, also known as sleeping sickness.
FIND and the World Health Organization will collaborate in seeking to identify, test and implement diagnostics that will increase the likelihood of early detection of HAT and the opportunity for treatment, states a WHO release.
"The spread of human African trypanosomiasis has reached epidemic proportions in regions of Africa. There is clearly a great need for a simple, accurate and cost-effective way to diagnose this disease so that it can be better treated and controlled," said Dr Giorgio Roscigno, CEO of FIND.
"Existing diagnostics for sleeping sickness are difficult to implement in remote, impoverished settings. We look forward to working with FIND to advance new diagnostic tests that could revolutionise human African trypanosomiasis control," said Dr Jean Jannin and Dr Pere Simarro, from the Neglected Tropical Diseases Control Department of the WHO.
"Developing point-of-care tests to direct sleeping sickness treatment will greatly simplify patient care, allowing for early case detection, simpler and safer treatment, and higher rates of cure that will improve disease management and could lead to the elimination of the disease as a public health problem," said Thomas Brewer, senior programme officer, infectious diseases division, global health programme, at the Gates Foundation.
Currently, diagnosis of sleeping sickness is made by serologic examinations followed by microscopy, which is laborious, insensitive and costly. FIND's and WHO's efforts will be focused on developing tools that will be simple to use and effective in the remote field conditions that exist where it is most prevalent. In addition to developing appropriate diagnostic technologies, the objectives of the programme include establishing field research sites for clinical studies and evaluating prototype products.
African sleeping sickness, a major public health threat in sub-Saharan Africa, spreads among people bitten by the tsetse fly and is fatal unless treated. Because early-stage infection produces few symptoms, it is thought that only 10% of patients with the disease are accurately diagnosed.
The Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND) was launched at the World Health Assembly in May 2003 as a non-profit Swiss foundation based in Geneva. Its purpose is to support and promote the health of people in developing countries by sponsoring the development and introduction of new but affordable diagnostic products for infectious diseases.