R1.5m allocated to academic medical research

Conscious of the unrelenting need for funding to develop research capacity and contribute to academic advancement in South Africa, ethical pharmaceutical company, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, has committed to disburse R4.5 million over a three year period. Two years into this pledge, it is expected that the research will generate significant data currently not available.

The Trust is an independent body with a sole mandate to administer the allocation of the funds to qualifying researchers. Managed by a scientific steering committee of six highly respected academics from various institutions around the country - they are responsible for screening, reviewing and ultimately with full autonomy, deciding on the apportionment of the grant funding. AstraZeneca has no influence nor can it participate in any decisions made regarding the fund allocation. This will be solely at the discretion of the committee administering the disbursements.

"We offer the finance and support to nurture groundbreaking intellect."

AstraZeneca Company President: South Africa and sub-Saharan Africa, Karl Friberg, says, "Not only have we given carte blanche to our steering committee to decide which proposals will receive funding, in the spirit of the project, and committed to unprejudiced research findings, we have made no attempt to limit the research to one of the seven therapeutic areas we are operational in. We offer the finance and support to nurture groundbreaking intellect."

Adding to this Friberg says that we are sitting on a veritable non-communicable disease time bomb. "Cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, obesity, metabolic syndrome and smoking related illnesses, are becoming increasingly prevalent and are the scourge of Africa. The continent is ill equipped to fight these modern-day illnesses and does not have the empirical data to properly manage and treat these potentially life-threatening diseases."

Further complicating this, the pharmaceutical industry has not traditionally invested in this area of research with funding customarily being allocated to compound and chemical entity developments. With extensive investment into research on HIV infection and TB, there has been little investment and focus on non-communicable diseases.

"For these reasons we are encouraging the generation of this much-needed epidemiological data on non-communicable and other diseases - for without current, accurate data, we have no line of sight to the extent of the problem, nor how to manage it," says Friberg. "There is virtually no data on African females in even the most basic disease areas and we want to change this and be part of the data generation process; even if we cannot use it directly as a company - we want to be part of the solution."

Submissions for grant funding must be made by the 2 March 2015 deadline. All applicants should submit a Letter of Intent (LOI) however preference will be given to Masters, PhD and Post-Doctorates.

Successful applicants will be contacted by 15 April 2015 whereby the full proposal will be requested for submission. A six to eight week review period will be allocated for the Scientific Steering Committee to make the necessary decisions.

"We hope our grants will help us meet a huge area of unmet need, ensuring the reprioritisation of healthcare initiatives and helping bring specific solutions to unique environments - reshaping the landscape as we know it," concludes Friberg.

This initiative is supported unconditionally by AstraZeneca. More information can be found at www.astrazenecatrust.co.za.