Chennai: India is the fourth largest spender and is responsible for the lion’s share of public funding among low and middle income countries (LMICs) when it comes to research and development on tropical diseases, a study has said.
The findings come from an analysis of global investment into research and development (R&D) on new products for neglected diseases in developing countries. The 11th annual G-Finder survey said, “This year, India maintains its position as the fourth largest government funder globally into neglected disease research. It tops among other compatriot LMICs, contributing 72 per cent of all the funding towards neglected disease research.”
India also records the strongest global growth in public funding for R&D on neglected diseases since 2009.
The report examines funding from government sources, philanthropies, private sector funding and other types of organisations.
Among LMIC’s, the top three public funders into research in 2017 were India ($76 million), South Africa ($14 million) and Brazil ($9.2 million).
LMIC public funding increased even though Brazil cut back heavily. The report says that the increased funding from LMIC’s “was due to a large increase in Indian government investment, which was in turn entirely due to additional funding from the Indian ICMR”.
The survey also looks at funding for a number of diseases like trachoma, buruli ulcer, rheumatic fever, meningitis, leptospirosis and also for HIV/AIDS, malaria, TB, dengue, hepatitis C and leprosy.
According to the G-Finder report, TB research gets the largest of all Indian government funding, with Rs 147 crore (30 per cent). Malaria is a close second with Rs 115 crore (23 per cent), while leprosy gets Rs 39 crore, dengue, Rs 35 crore, and HIV/AIDS, Rs 14 crore.
The top public funding agencies into R&D on neglected diseases in India are the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR), the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), the Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) and Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC).
ICMR’s overall funding in 2017 increased by 61 per cent to Rs 38 crore. Among global government funders for R&D, ICMR is the fourth largest on TB, the third largest on dengue and the second largest on leptospirosis.