DNDi was founded in 2003 to address the needs of patients with the most neglected diseases. DNDi is a collaborative, patients’ needs-driven, not-for-profit drug research and development (R&D) organisation that is currently developing new treatments against sleeping sickness (human African trypanosomiasis, HAT), visceral leishmaniasis (VL), Chagas disease, and malaria.
© Dndi
The primary objective of DNDi is to deliver six to eight new treatments by 2014 for these diseases and to establish a strong R&D portfolio that addresses patient needs.
In doing this, DNDi has two other objectives:
• to use and strengthen existing capacities in disease-endemic countries via project implementation; and
• to raise awareness about the need to develop new drugs for neglected diseases and particularly to advocate for increased public responsibility.
DNDi’s founding partners are primarily from the public sector in endemic countries: the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation/Farmanguinhos in Brazil, the Indian Council for Medical Research, the Kenya Medical Research Institute, and the Ministry of Health in Malaysia, while MSF, the Institut Pasteur, and the UNICEF/UNDP/World Bank/WHO’s Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR) are permanent observers.
Throughout 2007, DNDi made significant headway along the road to achieving its mission: a portfolio including a number of strong projects for its target diseases; two fixed-dose antimalarials; research platforms to strengthen capacity (in discovery research: PAN4ND; in clinical research: the LEAP and HAT Platforms); and funding secured from a number of governments including France, the Netherlands, Spain, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Union.
DNDi has regional offices in United States of America, Kenya, India, Brazil, Malaysia, Japan and a project support office in Democratic Republic of Congo
To learn more about DNDi’s activities, please visit www.dndi.org
