Health Innovation Networks to Help Developing Countries Address Neglected Diseases

Carlos Morel, Denis Broun, Ajit Dangi, Christopher Elias, Charles Gardner, Rk Gupta, Jane Haycock, Tony Heher Heher, Peter Hotez Hotez, Calestous Juma, Hannah Kettler, Anatole Krattiger, Fernando Kreutz, Keun Lee () and Et Al.

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: There is a great unmet need for health technologies to address diseases of the poor in developing countries. At the same time, there is a rapidly growing capability to undertake health innovation in many developing countries (Innovative Developing Countries - IDCs). The more advanced IDCs have the greatest capacity to develop, manufacture, ensure safety, and market new health products and to develop, test and introduce new health policies or strategies. They are distinguished by their rapidly growing strength in health innovation as illustrated by increasing patenting and publishing activities; increasing investments in technology by both the public and private research based sectors; rapidly growing number of health technology companies ; and proactive health systems able to analyze, evaluate and adopt new practices and technologies. This innovation capability provides a currently underleveraged opportunity to accelerate the development of new products, policies or strategies for diseases of the poor. We are therefore calling for the formation of an Initiative for Health Product Innovation in Developing Countries. Its primary mission will be to accelerate the translation of new knowledge into health innovations relevant to the diseases of the poor and to economic growth, taking into account national priorities and sensitivities. The Initiative could promote innovation, within and among IDCs, through programs to: (i) support research on health innovation systems; (ii) promote collaboration and coordination among countries to develop, disseminate and implement good practices and policies; and (iii) implement demonstration projects. Such an Initiative would help maximize existing and growing investments by developing countries in health research, and complement global efforts to address health disparities and achieve the Millennium Development Goals.

Keywords: neglected disease; health product innovation; developing countries (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I0 O35 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005-07-15
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in Science July.309(2005): pp. 401-403

Downloads: (external link)
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/109906/1/MPRA_paper_109906.pdf original version (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:109906

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany Ludwigstraße 33, D-80539 Munich, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Joachim Winter ().