The Innovative Medicines Initiative's New Drugs for Bad Bugs programme: European public–private partnerships for the development of new strategies to tackle antibiotic resistance

Abstract

Antibiotic resistance (ABR) is a global public health threat. Despite the emergence of highly resistant organisms and the huge medical need for new drugs, the development of antibacterials has slowed to an unacceptable level worldwide. Numerous government and non-government agencies have called for public-private partnerships and innovative funding mechanisms to address this problem. To respond to this public health crisis, the Innovative Medicines Initiative Joint Undertaking programme has invested more than €660 million, with a goal of matched contributions from the European Commission and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, in the development of new antibacterial strategies. The New Drugs for Bad Bugs (ND4BB) programme, an Innovative Medicines Initiative, has the ultimate goal to boost the fight against ABR at every level from basic science and drug discovery, through clinical development to new business models and responsible use of antibiotics. Seven projects have been launched within the ND4BB programme to achieve this goal. Four of them will include clinical trials of new anti-infective compounds, as well as epidemiological studies on an unprecedented scale, which will increase our knowledge of ABR and specific pathogens, and improve the designs of the clinical trials with new investigational drugs. The need for rapid concerted action has driven the funding of seven topics, each of which should add significantly to progress in the fight against ABR. ND4BB unites expertise and provides a platform where the commitment and resources required by all parties are streamlined into a joint public-private partnership initiative of unprecedented scale.

Bloodstream infections in neutropenic cancer patients: A practical update

“…[5][6][7][8] In the last decade, a worldwide increase in multidrug resistant (MDR) strains has occurred and numerous initiatives have tried to draw public attention to the fact that there are bacteria against which few or no active antibiotics exist. [9][10][11] The acronym ESKAPE (Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterobacter spp.) summarizes the most threatening pathogens circulating today.…”

“…summarizes the most threatening pathogens circulating today. [9][10][11] Antimicrobial resistance is reported according to the clinical breakpoints recommended by the European Committee on Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (EUCAST), the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) or the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Various definitions of MDR pathogens have been used, but a joint initiative by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) expert panel defined multidrug resistance as acquired non-susceptibility to at least one agent in 3 or more antimicrobial categories which are relevant for a given species.…”

Thiophene antibacterials that allosterically stabilize DNA-cleavage complexes with DNA gyrase

“…Recently, several calls for renewed and concerted efforts in antibiotic discovery have been made (4,5). One response to this urgent need is the New Drugs for Bad Bugs (ND4BB) suite of projects launched by the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), a publicprivate partnership (6). We [GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)] have identified a series of DNA gyrase inhibitors that bind to a site on the gyrase enzyme and have determined that the mode of action both is distinct from known DNA gyrase antibacterials and has no crossresistance to currently used topoisomerase-targeting antibacterials.…”

“…We [GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)] have identified a series of DNA gyrase inhibitors that bind to a site on the gyrase enzyme and have determined that the mode of action both is distinct from known DNA gyrase antibacterials and has no crossresistance to currently used topoisomerase-targeting antibacterials. This series was further developed in a collaborative effort within the IMI-funded European Gram-negative Antibacterial Engine (ENABLE) project (6), an academic-industry open-innovation partnership for antibacterial discovery that is a component of the ND4BB platform.…”

In 2035, will all bacteria be multidrug-resistant? No

“…Nowadays, a vast majority of hospital staff members are confronted with multidrug resistance in their routine practice, and one could hope that this situation will further raise awareness about the problem, thereby easing the implementation and acceptation of constraining prevention campaigns in the years to come. Finally, large-scaled initiatives are currently employed to facilitate more rapid development and clinical evaluation of new antimicrobial agents [17]. These efforts, plus the use of efficient ASPs [5], improved infection diagnostics [8], earlier targeted narrow-spectrum antibiotic use [6], better dosing strategies [12], shorter antibiotic duration [18,19], adequate hygiene policies [6], and controlled antibiotic use outside the healthcare setting [4] further strengthen our position that effective treatments will remain available in 2035.…”