Cures Within Reach: Repurposing treatments for use in low and lower middle income countries

Clare Thibodeaux - Cures Within Reach, Chicago, USA

I’m going to talk about repurposing research as a way to find treatments for patients with unmet needs in low and lower middle income countries. We know that the need for access to medicines is highest in these low and lower middle income countries, however, most of research dollars are focussed on other countries – the US, China, Japan, those sorts of things. We feel like these types of grants to support repurposing research in low and lower middle income countries will build capacity for research in these countries, while at the same time finding treatments that are easily accessible for patients in the local communities.

How does your program work?

I’ll start by talking to you a little bit about what repurposing research is, not everybody is familiar with that term. Repurposing research is taking drugs, devices, nutraceuticals that have been approved, determined safe to use in humans and testing them to see if they’re safe and effective in different indications. This is a model that Cures Within Reach, as a non-profit, has executed successfully in North America and Europe and now we’re looking to transfer that model to low and lower middle income countries.

Where are you focussed in the world?

This is what we’re calling our ReGRoW program, so I’ll just call it that to make it short. We are, again, focussing on those countries that the World Bank considers to be low and lower middle income. What we are doing right now is the very beginning stages of the pilot – we are talking to other organisations that have had experience in these areas. Again, Cures Within Reach has worked in North America and Europe and we have relationships there, so we’re starting to build those relationships in low and lower middle income countries.

Are there any barriers to overcome in this kind of work?

That’s a really great question. One of the challenges that we find in our current work, first of all there is no centralised place for repurposing when we’re talking to universities. There is absolutely an oncology department, a neuroscience department but there’s no department of repurposing. So it’s centralising these projects.

The other challenge is it’s not always seen as innovative to do repurposing research and so investigators who are pursuing these areas aren’t always encouraged to pursue those projects. Instead, they’re looking more towards new drug development.

Thirdly is that the economic incentives for repurposing research are not always there. Many times these are generic drugs and so finding the funders and the support to back this research can be challenging.

Can you give me some examples of repurposed drugs in use?

Drugs that are already available? That’s a really great question because last night Cures Within Reach had what we call our CureAccelerator Live! event. This is a repurposing research pitch event where PIs come and pitch their research ideas and then one is selected as the winner for $50,000 in funding. We had five really great finalists who were looking at repurposed therapies in dengue, malnutrition, tuberculosis, Zika and chronic pancreatitis and these all used readily available drugs. So those are just five really great examples that we’ve found for this evening’s event and we know there are many others out there who have these therapies, who have these ideas and just need that catalytic spark that we can provide with these research grants to get their ideas off the ground.

What would you like to see happen over the next few years with Cures Within Reach?

As Cures Within Reach expands and grows we hope to have an even bigger presence in the developing world. We know that if we find treatments that work in low and lower middle income countries the chances are they’re going to work everywhere in the world. So we really want to increase our global impact. There are thousands and thousands of unsolved diseases out there and we have thousands of already approved medications. If we can bring those together to solve those unsolved medical needs that would be fantastic and a really great complement to the new drug discovery that happens all the time.

Is there anything you’d like to add?

I would just add that we are looking for partners; we are looking for people who are interested in helping us with our ReGRoW program. Whether it’s providing brain power assistance, whether it’s providing introductions into the developing world or financial support, we’d love to hear from you.