Impact funds help fight dementia and antibiotic resistance
Marc Gitzinger started his “adventure” in antibiotics 12 years ago, co-founding Swiss start-up BioVersys to tackle deadly and drug-resistant pathogens, such as strains of tuberculosis. He has watched as even promising peer companies collapsed, and had to slow his own development programmes for fear of running out of money.
“I personally find it unacceptable that we would have drugs in hand that help a significant number of patients from not passing away — and we have to drop this for financial reasons, rather than scientific ones,” he says.
BioVersys is now pushing two of its antibiotics into Phase 2 trials thanks, in part, to an investment late last year from the AMR (antimicrobial resistance) Action Fund — a public-private partnership. It finances the development of new antibiotics, in response to worries about microbes becoming resistant to the drugs currently available, which could result in bacterial diseases that cannot be controlled.
For many drugmakers, impact funds may also have a “public relations” role to play, following criticism of big industry names for leaving the antibiotics field, says Jonathan Kfoury, a partner at LEK Consulting. Covid-19 has provided further impetus, both in showing how one outbreak can quickly spread around the world, prompting a renewed focus on global health challenges, and in generating massive revenues.
“Some large pharmas have made record profit levels from Covid vaccines and therapeutics,” Kfoury points out. “AMR, as well as the broader idea of global health — which includes low- and middle-income countries — are natural areas for them to reinvest some of the vast profit levels that they’ve made in the last couple of years.”
In addition, impact investing could be used to fund healthcare innovation in other areas where, as Bingham says, “people are not investing, because it’s too difficult” — such as in mental health.
As is the case with dementia, it can be hard to run mental health trials and prove efficacy, yet there is also hope. Bingham points to the prospect not just of new drugs but also of digital and app-based treatments. “There’s huge scope for innovation,” she says.
This story originally appeared on: Financial Times - Author:Hannah Kuchler
