Oct 13, 2006

Brazil’s Efforts to Eradicate Hookworm May Pay

by Laura Starita

The Washington Post recently reported on an initiative to eradicate hookworm in Brazil by linking private donor funds (in this case, $53 million in grants from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) with a Brazilian vaccine manufacturer and the local public health infrastructure. As we have previously written, the economics of pharmaceutical research often prevents large pharmaceutical companies from developing medicines to treat diseases that disproportionately affect the poor (see our previous post on Black Fever). This means that if these diseases are going to be eradicated someone else has to come in and fill the gap.

In the case of the hookworm initiative, Brazilian scientists have teamed up with US scientists and the Washington-based Sabin Vaccine Institute to develop the vaccine; a Brazilian company, the Butantan Institute, will manufacture it and local public health clinics will distribute it. Brazil’s long-term goal is to develop a medication that it can afford to distribute itself, thus avoiding long-term dependence on foreign donors.

On the surface, this project seems to be doing a lot of things right: involving the local community, relying on local resources, adding value from the outside only where it is needed. Furthermore, it is a worthwhile project with ramifications beyond its public-health roots; eradicating hookworm – an illness which causes debilitating fatigue in its victims, making them unable to work or farm productively – could have a long-term positive impact on the economic outlook of Brazil’s poor.

Washington Post: In Brazil, Field Trials To Treat World’s Poor