Incentives for antibiotics: Summary of DRIVE-AB / Slides from the 6-8 Sep 2017 ASM-ESCMID meeting

Dear All:

I wrote twice last week with materials from the 5-8 Sep ASM-ESCMID conference (EMA-FDA-NICE updates and the CARB-X + GARDP Bootcamps. But there’s more … in parallel, we last week also had the final DRIVE-AB conference in Brussels! In the absence of a Star Trek transporter it was not possible to attend both, but I did hear from others who attended and I also gave a talk at the ASM-ESCMID conference in which I summarized some of the material from the final DRIVE-AB conference.

My summary talk can be downloaded here. Highlights for your consideration would be:

  • Antibiotics are the fire extinguishers of medicine, but we currently pay for them as if we were paying the fire department on a per fire basis. As you know well, this is the fundamental economic hurdle to overcome.
  • As a path to transforming the way policymakers stimulate innovation, responsible use and global access to novel antibiotics to meet public health needs, DRIVE-AB sought solutions that were consistent with the principles of Access, Sustainable Use, and Innovation.
  • To achieve this, DRIVE-AB created 4 blocks of insight: (1) a common language for measuring things like sustainable use, (2) models to predict emergence & spread of AMR, (3) new HTA metrics for antibiotic value, and (4) incentive models.
  • The first three of these elements are the building blocks that support the fourth element, the incentive models for antibacterial R&D (see graphic below).
  • Four incentive models are recommended. Two provide Push (Grants & a Pipeline Coordinator) and two provide Pull (Market Entry Rewards and a Long-Term Continuity Model). All four of these models are important as they together drive innovation, while supporting sustainable use and access.  Push incentives alone are not sufficient
  • Note that there is pop-quiz buried in the slide deck. The answer is found at the very end of this email … try not to look too soon!
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​More details + a variety of official written reports will be forthcoming from DRIVE-AB over the next few months. And of course we now have to take the big step of making a Market Entry Reward (or two or three) happen. There is nothing definitive yet in any territory, but I am aware of a number of discussions that are making strong headway. It won’t be easy, but DRIVE-AB has definitely achieved its goal of creating the required mutual understanding among a wide group of stakeholders with diverse backgrounds.

And while DRIVE-AB has been the work of many hands, I want to in particular call out the contributions of 4 individuals. First, Stephan Harbarth (University of Geneva) and Judy Hackett (AstraZeneca) did a splendid job as the academic and industry co-leads for the overall project. And Christine Årdal (Norwegian Institute of Public Health) and David Findlay (GSK) demonstrated true leadership skills as they crystallized and summarized the debates around the incentive models.

Having been there at the birth of DRIVE-AB (James Anderson of GSK and I spent many hours working with EFPIA’s Richard Bergstrom and Brendan Barnes on the basic design of the project), I am just delighted to see it all coming to fruition! I know that it times it felt like (and was like) herding cats but we all owe these four a debt of thanks for their many hours of effort.

All best wishes, –jr

John H. Rex, MD | Chief Medical Officer, F2G Ltd. | Chief Strategy Officer, CARB-X | Expert-in-Residence, Wellcome Trust. Follow me on Twitter: @JohnRex_NewAbx. See past newsletters and subscribe for the future: http://amr.solutions/blog/

Upcoming meetings of interest to the AMR community:

PS: The answer to the pop quiz is that a reasonable rule-of-thumb would be $20m/year.

Dear All,
 
The IDWeek 2024 program committee is again seeking programs on novel antimicrobial agents and novel diagnostics for presentation in pipeline sessions! Here’s what is sought:

  • “Industry partners are invited to submit antimicrobials that are in preclinical stages of development (Phase II and III preferred) or recently approved after January 2024.
  • “The pipeline sessions will include antibacterials, antifungals, and antivirals (excluding COVID-19 and HIV).
  • “The committee also invites companies developing novel diagnostic technologies with a minimum of some preliminary proof of concept data to submit.” 

This is a great opportunity to tell the story of your development project! The deadline to submit is Wednesday, June 26 via the application portal. Any questions should be directed to program@idsociety.org. Please share this email with anyone you think might be interested in applying!
 
In addition, I’ll also note that those with a more general story to tell should look at the BugHub Stage (and the Global BugHub stage). Both BugHub variants seek “presentations that touch on your experience of working in infectious diseases and presentations that ultimately lead to a greater understanding of our diverse field” via a TED Talk-esque speech about your work. The deadline for applications is 26 June, the same as for the pipeline sessions.

I look forward to seeing you there! All best wishes, –jr

John H. Rex, MD | Chief Medical Officer, F2G Ltd. | Operating Partner, Advent Life Sciences. Follow me on Twitter: @JohnRex_NewAbx. See past newsletters and subscribe for the future: https://amr.solutions/blog/. All opinions are my own.

John’s Top Recurring Meetings

Virtual meetings are easy to attend, but regular attendance at annual in-person events is the key to building your network and gaining deeper insight. My personal favorites for such in-person meetings are below. Of particular value for developers are the AMR Conference and the ASM-ESCMID conference. Hope to see you there!

  • 27-30 April 2024 (Barcelona, Spain): 34th ECCMID, the annual meeting of the European Society for Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. Go here for details. 
  • 17-20 Sep 2024 (Porto, Portugal): ASM/ESCMID Joint Conference on Drug Development to Meet the Challenge of Antimicrobial Resistance. Go here for the meeting’s general website. You can’t register (yet) for the 2024 event, but save the date!
  • 16-20 Oct 2024 (Los Angeles, USA): IDWeek 2024, the annual meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. Save the date! More details to come!
  • 25-26 February 2025 (Basel, Switzerland): The 9th AMR Conference 2025. Go here to register

Upcoming meetings of interest to the AMR community:

  • [NEW]  9 Apr 2024 (virtual, 830a-10a ET): GARDP’s next REVIVE webinar entitled “Progressing a discovery project – Criteria and challenges.” Register here.
  • [NEW] 9 Apr 2024 (virtual, 10a-1130a ET): CDC webinar “Impacts of Antimicrobial Resistance on Cancer Care.” Click here for details and to register.
  • 10-11 Apr 2024 (virtual): Sepsis Alliance AMR Conference, a 2-day conference focused on “Practical technologies to manage sepsis and counteract the expanding challenge of antimicrobial resistance.” Go here for details and to register.
  • 26 Apr 2024 (Barcelona, Spain): ESCMID workshop entitled “Using Data Science and Machine Learning for Infection Science: A Hands-on Introduction.” Click here to register or here for more details. 
  • 27-30 April 2024 (Barcelona, Spain): 34th ECCMID, the annual meeting of the European Society for Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. See Recurring Meetings list, above.
  • 26-31 May 2024 (Montreal, Canada): EDAR7, the McGill AMR Centre’s 7th edition of their Environmental Dimension of Antimicrobial Resistance conference. Go here for details; final abstract deadline is 21 Dec 2023.
  • 28-29 May 2024 (in person, Uppsala, Sweden): Uppsala Antibiotic Days, a broad-ranging 2-day program hosted by the Uppsala Antibiotic Center. Go here for details and to register.
  • [NEW] 30-31 May 2024 (face-to-face in Rockville, Maryland as well as online, 8.30-5.30p ET on 30 May, 9-2.40p on 31 May): NIAID-sponsored workshop entitled “Towards realizing the promise of adjunctive immune therapy for invasive fungal infections”. The agenda covers host immunity to invasive fungal infections, immune modulators in the context of fungal infections; and strategies for testing immune modulators as adjunctive therapy. Go here for more details and to register.
  • 9-13 June 2024 (in person, Ascona, Switzerland): “New Approaches to Combat Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria, 2nd Edition” is a Sunday-Thursday residential workshop focused on the deep biology of AMR. Sponsored by NCCR AntiResist (a Swiss National Science Foundation consortium), the scientific program has the feel of a Gordon Conference. Space is limited, so you are encouraged to apply promptly — go here for details.
  • 13-17 June 2024 (Atlanta, Georgia): ASM Microbe, the annual meeting of the American Society for Microbiology. You can’t register yet, but you can go here for general details.
  • 17-20 Sep 2024 (Porto, Portugal): ASM/ESCMID Joint Conference on Drug Development to Meet the Challenge of Antimicrobial Resistance. See Recurring Meetings list, above.
  • 16-20 Oct 2024 (Los Angeles, USA): IDWeek 2024, the annual meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. See Recurring Meetings list, above. 
  • 19-27 Oct 2024 (Annecy, France, residential in-person program): ICARe (Interdisciplinary Course on Antibiotics and Resistance). Now in its 8th year, Patrice Courvalin directs the program with the support of an all-star scientific committee and faculty. The resulting soup-to-nuts training covers all aspects of antimicrobials, is very intense, and routinely gets rave reviews! Seating is limited, so mark your calendars now if you are interested. Applications open in March 2024 — go here for more details.
  • 4-5 Dec 2024 (in person, Washington, DC): “Fungal Dx 2024: Fungal Diagnostics in Clinical Practice” is a 2-day in-person workshop organized by ISHAM‘s Fungal Diagnostics Working Group. The program and registration links are available at https://fungaldx.com/; the agenda is comprehensive and features an all-star global list of speakers.

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