New Technique to Control Killer Disease Offered Multi Million Dollar Funding
29 June 2005
Oxitec Limited is pleased to announce that it is a member of a consortium that has been offered funding to develop new genetic strategies for control of dengue virus.
On Tuesday 28th June 2005 the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced $19.7 million for a pioneering technique to control dengue fever. This viral disease, nicknamed 'break-bone fever', is carried by mosquitoes, and is endemic in over 100 countries; 40% of the world's population is now at risk. Dengue is one of a family of viruses that includes yellow fever and West Nile Virus. Dengue fever infects 50 million people and kills 21,000 people annually. The disease has no effective treatments or vaccine.
The project is among 43 groundbreaking research projects to improve health in developing countries, supported by $436 million from the Grand Challenges in Global Health initiative.
A multinational team, led by the University of California, Irvine will work together combining expertise from molecular biology, field and social science. Oxitec, a spin out company from the University of Oxford, will receive some $4.8m, and will focus on using its breakthrough technology to sterilize mosquitoes, thereby reducing population numbers and ultimately preventing transmission of the disease. This would be a major step forward in the fight against dengue fever, because other methods of sterilizing mosquitoes, such as irradiation with gamma rays, are not currently practical. In addition, other methods to control mosquito numbers, including using insecticide, are not sufficiently effective against dengue mosquitoes.
Luke Alphey, Chief Scientist at Oxitec, said, "We are delighted to have this opportunity to accelerate our research. We are only at the early stages of making this technique a real possibility for those millions of people who suffer with this disease."
"Throughout the project we will make safety a priority; a significant part of the program is to identify and minimize potential risks. Before any field trials are initiated we will have carried out a comprehensive series of experiments to ensure that the strategy is effective and safe."
David Brooks, CEO of Oxitec, commented "Oxitec is delighted to receive this award which was granted after the most rigorous international review of its technology and its prospects. We believe that our technology will provide a major tool in the fight against this disease."
Notes
Oxitec was formed in 2002 as a spin out from the University of Oxford. The Company is pioneering environmentally safe methods of insect control. It has developed technology (RIDL™) that will radically reduce the cost of existing sterile insect programs, and open up new markets. The Company operates from a state of the art facility near Oxford, comprising molecular biology laboratories, insectaries and offices.
Consortium members
Led by University of California (UC), Irvine
- Oxitec Ltd., UK
- Seven US Universities (UC Irvine, Colorado State University, Texas A &M University, University of Notre Dame, North Carolina State University, Cornell University)
- Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, Brazil
- Regional Unit for Social and Human Sciences in Asia and the Pacific, UNESCO Thailand
The Grand Challenge initiative
The Grand Challenges initiative was launched by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2003, in partnership with the National Institutes of Health, with a $200 million grant to the FNIH and is a major international effort to achieve scientific breakthroughs against diseases that kill millions of people each year in the world’s poorest countries. It is funded with a $450 million commitment from Gates Foundation, $27.1 from the Wellcome Trust, and $4.5 million from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). The initiative is managed by global health experts at the Foundation for NIH, the Gates Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and CIHR.
The Consortium of which Oxitec is a member was selected to address Grand Challenges Number 7, "Develop a genetic strategy to deplete or incapacitate a disease transmitting insect population".