Celebrating 50 years of working alongside the LMIC malaria research community

This week, TDR organized a symposium at the Multilateral Initiative on Malaria (MIM)’s 8^th Pan-African Conference on Malaria, where key research partners shared experiences and testimonials to showcase the impact TDR has made on the malaria research community and on efforts to control malaria.  

Over the last five decades, TDR, the UNICEF/UNDP/World Bank/WHO Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases, has been a leader in research to address infectious diseases of poverty, including malaria, and in building the capacity of people, communities and institutions in low- and middle-income countries. 

“TDR is probably the most successful research organization. They've contributed to so many things that are really the backbone of malaria control today,” said Professor Pedro Alonso, Head of the Global Health Office at BioNTech and former Director of the Global Malaria Programme at WHO. “And they've done so while in parallel strengthening research capacity in Africa. I think it's a combination of these two things that makes TDR such a special organization.”

In the 1990s, TDR funded large-scale trials necessary to prove the effectiveness of insecticide-treated nets in sites across Ghana, Burkina Faso, Kenya and The Gambia that covered 400 000 children. The final results that insecticide-treated nets could reduce overall childhood mortality by an average of around 20% led to the WHO recommendation that they be a standard preventive treatment in malaria endemic areas, and their extensive distribution across the African continent.

TDR also coordinated a series of multi-country trials in Africa and Latin America between 1999 and 2001, comparing single-agent treatments to regimens where they were combined with artemisinin. These studies helped provide the evidence for a paradigm shift in malaria, from single-agent to artemisinin-combination therapy (ACT). “I was honored to be invited to the 2015 Nobel Prize ceremony where Tu Youyou was recognized for her discovery of artemisinin,” said TDR Director John Reeder.

The enduring impact of TDR’s efforts to strengthen research capacity 

To build malaria research capacity in Africa, TDR played a leading role in the establishment of MIM in 1997. Within ten years, 69 research grants were awarded to principal investigators in 17 African countries. “That first cohort of trainees are now influential research leaders – professors, directors and heads of major research institutions,” said Professor Olumide Ogundahunsi, Director of the Office of Strategy and Programme Management at the University of Medical Sciences in Ondo, Nigeria. Professor Ogundahunsi managed MIM grants awarded through TDR between 2000 and 2012. 

The new generation of TDR grantees have played a role in new tools to fight malaria. Through the Clinical Research and Development Fellowship, TDR has supported 20 African scientists who have contributed to the development of the RTS,S vaccine. One of them has also just co-authored a study published in the Lancet on the R21 vaccine. “These fellows have gone on to lead research in malaria and other relevant fields. There’s not one fellow whose career hasn’t gone through the roof,” said Dr Opokua Ofori-Anyinam, Senior Director and Global Scientific Affairs Lead at GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals. GlaxoSmithKline has hosted and trained more than 30 TDR fellows since 1999.

From left to right: Dr Stephen Vreden, Dr Nafomon Sogoba, Dr John Reeder, Dr Opokua Ofori-Anyinam, Professor Olumide Ogundahunsi and Professor Jean-Louis Ndiaye. Credit: MIM Society

Other research partners presented key findings from recent research conducted in collaboration with TDR. Professor Jean-Louis Ndiaye discussed research supporting malaria prevention in West Africa. Dr Nafomon Sogoba presented on a multisectoral approach to malaria in Mali, and Dr Stephen Vreden shared insights on deploying Malakit for malaria control and prevention in Suriname’s remote areas.