Lord Bates (Con)
My Lords, I am pleased to have the opportunity to respond to this debate, which has been fascinating, and led so movingly and passionately by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, who comes to this area with great expertise as a trustee in the Sabin Vaccine Institute and the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases. Putting this on the map annually is a way of ensuring that it keeps the heels of Her Majesty’s Government and others to the fire. It ensures that progress continues to be made.
The noble Baroness welcomed me to her world, which is a fascinating one. She outlined some of the creatures that inhabited it. I was going to make a quick aside about being no stranger to this world because it sounded rather familiar as a member of the Government Whips Office, but it would be inappropriate to do so. I am pleased to answer the question because every year neglected tropical diseases adversely affect the lives of more than a billion people, causing disability, disfigurement, stigma and an estimated half a million deaths, mainly in the poorest countries. By helping countries to tackle them we alleviate unnecessary suffering and help to reduce poverty. That point was made by many noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Collins and Lord Alton, who quoted the former President of Ghana, John Kufuor, in talking about the silver bullet and the bang for the buck, which I think the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, mentioned, in terms of public health and its effect on alleviating poverty.
The noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked me to update your Lordships on progress made since the London declaration. Since that meeting the UK has launched a trachoma programme that completes the mapping of the disease. The noble Lord, Lord Crisp, referred to that in his association with Sightsavers. It is an incredible programme that will be immensely beneficial as part of the general research effort. We are delighted to be part of it. New programmes will be developed to tackle NTDs in an integrated fashion in Nigeria and South Sudan. I will come back to the point about South Sudan, which the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, referred to, later in my remarks. We have helped World Health Organisation to strengthen its NTD capacity, and approved a programme to help deal with kala azar in south Asia and east Africa, which I am sure that my noble friend Lord Sheikh will be pleased to note given the personal experiences that he brought to the debate.
We have maintained UK support for the Carter Center’s Guinea worm eradication programme, and I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Chidgey for raising that example. As someone who was clearly coming to this from a non-expert position, to be frank, it was heartening to hear that a disease that in 1986 had 3.5 million people suffering with Guinea worm in 20 countries could be reduced to 154 in four countries, through concerted effort and focus and investment in research. Within a lifetime, that is a remarkable case study. He was also absolutely right to remind us that we cannot be complacent, because of the example of TB, which he highlighted.
The noble Lord, Lord Stone, spoke about support on river blindness and bilharzia. We have extended our support for that, including the elephantiasis programme. We have invested in more research on how best to deliver the NTD programme in a cost-effective and sustainable way. The point about research, raised effectively by the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, was important. I will come back to that if I can, because research is at the heart of this. It was heartening to have so many contributions, including those from the noble Lords, Lord Patel, Lord Alton and Lord Crisp, referring to the excellence in research. Those were the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick: the UK is a hub of research excellence. The noble Lord, Lord Stone, spoke about exciting initiatives with Imperial College combining with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine to provide further research in that area. I would be delighted to arrange a meeting with the appropriate Ministers and officials in the Department for International Development to see how we can support that work going forward.
There are also product development partnerships, including the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative—FIND and DNDi—which we are supporting. We also support operational research through a number of channels, including our existing commitments to the World Health Organisation’s tropical disease research programme and wider health-related research programme consortia.
Underpinning the results lies a collaborative network. We continue to work closely with donor colleagues, particularly the US Agency for International Development, the World Bank, the World Health Organisation and, of course, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, to improve the way in which we tackle these diseases. National Governments are key partners too, particularly in the delivery of mass drug administration through schools and communities. An important point was made on that by, I think, the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, about this being about not just national Governments—that because these are diseases of the rural poor we should have people down at a village level engaged in tackling them.
Several of your Lordships mentioned the need for better integration between different NTD initiatives, as well as closer working with other disease programmes and with sectors such as water and sanitation, which are all part of the same issue. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, mentioned that, and the noble Lords, Lord Alton and Lord Crisp, and of course the noble Lord, Lord Collins, all referred to the vital way at which we should get better at integrating how we tackle these diseases—not just with medicines, but with water, sanitation and research. These challenges would be much tougher without the major contribution that the pharmaceutical industry makes through sustained and highly effective drug donation programmes. Combining their donations and our support to improve delivery is at the heart of the public and private sector. Several noble Lords referred specifically to the work of Merck in that capacity, and the great generosity that it has shown.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, asked for an update on the closure of AstraZeneca, and the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, also referred to that. It has announced that it is closing a major factory in India that was producing NTD medicines. Her Majesty’s Government believe that the pharmaceutical industry has an important contribution to make in enhancing access for the poor to essential medicines. The AstraZeneca decision appears to be part of a wider restructuring programme. Other pharmaceutical companies remain active in this precise area, including Merck, Johnson & Johnson and GlaxoSmithKline, and they donate free drugs to certain neglected diseases. The French drug maker Sanofi is also working on a vaccine for dengue fever. That is part of the update there.
The noble Lord, Lord Crisp, asked me to consider what DfID could be doing for those living with disabilities. More than 1 billion people, 15% of the global population, live with disability. Many of the programmes tackling NTDs prevent disability, so as well as prevention DfID is also pressing for disability to be included in the post-2015 framework under the principle, outlined in the high-level panel report, of “no one left behind”. That is a very important principle that I hope offers some reassurance to the noble Lord, who rightly raises those concerns.
In 2012 we substantially increased our commitment in terms of donations. Several noble Lords referred to the amount of funding that goes into this area and the funding gap that is still there. We acknowledge that, but it is worth putting on record that if you look back to 2008 you see that the average budget going into NTDs from the UK Government for research, medicines and so on was about £1 million. As a result of the London declaration conference that went up to £10 million per annum, and now it stands on average at about £40 million per annum.
The noble Lords, Lord Patel and Lord Alton, spoke about how it was important to encourage other countries to step up to the plate and make their contributions in this area. Her Majesty’s Government are continuing to do that. It is also the place of international organisations to do that much more effectively, such as the World Health Organisation.
I turn to the millennium development goals. This of course brings us right back, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman commented, not to repeating the same Motion before your Lordships’ House as last year but, this year, emphasising the importance of the millennium development goals. The high-level panel, which was co-chaired by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, included in its recommendations that NTDs should not just be listed as “other diseases” under MDG 6, as they are in the present MDGs, but actually ought to be specified and listed—at least seven of them, and perhaps 10. That was the recommendation that it made, which her Majesty’s Government absolutely support. That programme is now under review. There are some 30 groups that the UN Secretary-General has established to take forward the recommendations by the high-level panel, and they will be put before the General Assembly when it meets in September. The period of time between now and September to re-emphasise the importance of having those diseases specified is therefore very important.
This has been a very important debate in raising this issue in a timely and effective way. Again, I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, for mentioning it. The words of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, when he said that:
“Poverty reduction and the elimination of NTDs go hand-in-hand”,
was quite precise and to the point. That is why Her Majesty’s Government are supporting that, not only with our efforts behind the millennium development goals but with the money that we are putting into research and medicines.