Public health institutions play significant role in drug development, but funding could be in danger

Stevens AJ. N Engl J Med. 2011;364:535-41.

Issue: March 2011

Public sector research institutions may have played a significant role in the discovery and development of several medications and vaccines over the past several decades. However, proposed cuts by federal administrators for this type of research institution could mean a “dangerous step backwards” for these efforts, according to a special article published online and a corresponding statement issued by several health organizations this week.

The article, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, looked at FDA-approved new drugs and vaccines that were discovered by public-sector research institutions and classified them according to their therapeutic category and potential therapeutic effect. The researchers noted that during the past 40 years, public-research institution-led investigations yielded 153 new FDA-approved drugs, vaccines, or new indications for existing drugs.

“More than half of these drugs have been used in the treatment or prevention of cancer or infectious diseases,” the researchers wrote.

The article was cited in a public statement, issued today, from officials with the IDSA, the HIV Medicine Association and the Center for Global Health Policy. They wrote that the study findings highlight the danger in proposed House Appropriation cuts that were announced earlier this week.

In a press release on the cuts, the House of Representatives’ House of Appropriations notes that their goal is to “reduce spending from the President’s fiscal year 2011 request by a total of $74 billion,” with many federal health agencies, such as the CDC, the NIH, the FDA, the Health Resources and Services Administration, the United States Agency for International Development, and others, absorbing a large brunt of those cuts. The proposed cuts would slash $220 million from FDA, $755 million from CDC, and $1 billion from NIH.

Cutting funding for these agencies “would mean a dangerous step backwards for patients’ health, here and around the world,” IDSA and other officials wrote in the paper. “These cuts will translate into reduced surveillance and control programs to protect people from antimicrobial resistance, inadequate screening and treatment for HIV and tuberculosis, and fewer people receiving immunizations against life-threatening but preventable diseases.”

Although the health organizations acknowledged a need for getting the “nation’s fiscal house in order,” they wrote that “shortsighted cuts will lead to dramatically higher costs tomorrow, measured not just in dollars but in care provided to those suffering from diseases that could have been prevented, fewer medical advances, and lives lost.”

Disclosure: The researchers on the special article report no relevant disclosures.

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