E-DRUG: New MSF document on malaria in the Asia Pacific
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Dear all
"ACT NOW in the Asia Pacific" is a new MSF document looking at malaria in
the Asia Pacific. It is directed towards government officials, health
providers, donors and the WHO. It looks at the impact of malaria in this
region, resistance levels in each country, and explains the advantages of
ACT's. It is relevant for all the countries in the Asia Pacific with a
significant malaria problem, those that haven't yet changed to first line
ACT's (much of India, Sri Lanka, Phillipines, the Pacific) and for those
that have recently done so (Indonesia, NE India, Laos, Bangladesh) as well
as for donor countries involved in the region.
It also
- describes current national protocols and donor positions
- describes and calls for the use of rapid diagnostic tests
- descibes the current shortage of ACT's and the need for donors and WHO to
support bulk prepurchasing, to allow a scaling up of quality production
- calls for increased resources for the WHO prequalification process.
MSF Australia have hard copies of the document which we would be happy to
send out. Could you please let us know if you would like some, and how
many.
Alternatively, the PDF or word versions can be accessed at the MSF
Australia website: http://www.msf.org.au/ , under 'MSF reports'.
Updates on the document:
Need for advance funding of bulk purchases
Since writing the document MSF has found that the current "shortage" of
ACT, which is already having an an impact on price and availability
worldwide, is primarily due to a lack of firm up-front orders. Producers
are not willing to increase production capacity by huge amounts without
pre-purchases. Considering the long lead time between cultivation and
production of finished product, shortages could last for several years if
money is not secured to pre-purchase large quantities of ACTs. There is an
urgent need to upscale cultivation and quality production, by providing
international funds for bulk orders. While the development of a synthetic
artemisinin is promising, it is likely to take years before it reaches the
market, so the short-mid term focus needs to be on increasing Artemisia
annua cultivation and artemisinin extraction capacity.
At the moment the only formulations prequalified by WHO are Co-artem and
the single artesunate tablets of Sanofi. There is however a shortage of
Coartem which will persist throughout 2005 and maybe into 2006. It should
be noted that several other ACTs which can be used in many countries and
are generally cheaper than Coartem, such as artesunate and amodiaquine
co-blisters, and single artesunate tablets to be combined with SP, are
assessed and approved for purchase by WHO/UNICEF. This includes the
formulations of Cipla, Ipca (both India)
http://rbm.who.int/docs/mmss/procuringACTpreferentialprices.pdf
and the single prequalified artesunate tablets from Sanofi.
Warm wishes
Alyosha Jacobson
Access to Essential Medicines Campaign
alyosha.jacobson@sydney.msf.org
0011 61295524933
Dr Alyosha Jacobson
Access to Essential Medicines Campaign
Medecins Sans Frontieres/ Doctors Without Borders
alyosha.jacobson@sydney.msf.org
02 9552 4933