Global AIDS Vaccine research body CAVD keen on India

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Global AIDS research body keen on India

WRITANKAR MUKHERJEE

TIMES NEWS NETWORK [THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 2007 02:39:34 AM]

KOLKATA: A global biotech drug research consortium developing AIDS

vaccine — Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery (CAVD) — is keen

to have a presence in India.

The CAVD, which enjoys major grant support from the Bill & Melinda

Gates Foundation, has approached the West Bengal government to

jointly develop a research facility in the state with a local

partner.

The CAVD also plans to extend its scope of research to `poverty-

related diseases' of particular relevance to India like TB and

malaria. The state government has already identified two Kolkata-

based organisations for the tie-up - School of Tropical Medicine and

Bose Institute.

CAVD is coordinated by Germany's Fraunhofer-Institute for Biomedical

Engineering (IBMT). It is an international network of 11 vaccine

discovery consortia with the mandate to apply new technologies,

concepts and approaches to the design of safe and effective

preventive vaccine against HIV/AIDS.

Confirming the development, West Bengal's biotech and IT secretary

Mr Siddharth told ET: " The consortium has recently expressed

interest to jointly conduct biotech research and set up a research

facility with a local partner in the state. They will provide us a

draft proposal within a fortnight on the finer details of

collaboration. "

The CAVD has indicated the alliance with an Indian partner will

primarily be to explore new concepts and ideas in the area

of `poverty-related' disease research. " They wish to conduct drug

research for diseases which are of particular relevance to India.

Possible areas are HIV, malaria and tuberculosis, " said Mr

Siddharth.

The biotech secretary said the possible choice for the tie-up is

either School of Tropical Medicine or Bose Institute. " Both

institutions have huge domain knowledge in advanced biotechnology.

Once we receive the draft proposal, we will finalise the local

partner. We expect to finalise the alliance in a month's time, " Mr

Siddharth said.

The proposal from CAVD was given to the state government during the

state biotech secretary's recent visit to IBMT facilities in

Germany. The state secretary was recently in Germany to hardsell

West Bengal as a possible biotech destination.

The CAVD was established in July 2006 with the Gates Foundation

funding of $287 million with additional co-funding provided by

Fraunhofer Society, Ministry of Economic Affairs of Saarland in

Germany and the Swiss State Secretariat of Education and Research.

Apart from IBMT, other prominent partners in CAVD include the likes

of World Health Organisation (WHO) in Geneva, National Institute for

Biological Standards and Control in London, National Institutes of

Health & University of Washington in US, University of Saarland in

Germany and Lund University in Sweden.

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