As part of European Commission’s research and innovation outreach through Horizon 2020, the European Union and India will collaborate to develop the next-generation influenza vaccine
The European Union (EU) and Government of India’s Department of Biotechnology are going to a collaborate in developing the next generation influenza vaccine. Each side will commit €15 million (total of approximately ₹240 crores) for the project, which is being funded by the EU for European Commission’s Horizon 2020 project. Horizon 2020 is the financial instrument of EU’s largest Research and Innovation programme called Innovation Union, with nearly €80 billion of funding available over 7 years (2014 to 2020), in addition to private investments. It aims to pioneer breakthroughs and discoveries by ‘taking great ideas from the lab to the market’.
The information and project preparation events were held in the four cities of New Delhi, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Pune. These events were to attract potential applicants for joint-proposals. The project will offer opportunities to all stakeholders from lab to market – research, pre-clinical trials and vaccine developers – from Europe and India. Eligible participants are industries, universities, research and technology organizations, hospitals, NGOs, etc. A minimum of 3 applicants can be accepted from both Europe (3 EU states, or countries associated with Horizon 2020) and India. Ambassador of the European Union to India Tomasz Kozlowski has said that, “in engaging jointly on this topic, India and the EU are contributing to an important global public health challenge”.
This collaboration aims at fulfilling Sustainable Development Goal 3 of ensuring health and well being of all, which itself is a list of nine goals, of which one is to provide ‘access to safe, effective, quality and affordable essential medicines and vaccines for all.’ With around 500,000 death around the world annually due to this contagious viral respiratory disease, it has become a major global hazard. Furthermore, emergence of new strains have the potential to erupt into major influenza pandemics. Moreover, vaccines for this virus are only moderately effective and also need to be developed every year, as there are many influenza sub-types. All these factors increase the health burden and also pose the risk of pandemics, especially regarding the various sub-types and strains.
Influenza is a major health concern globally, including in Europe and India. It’s symptoms are high sudden onset of high fever, aching muscles, severe malaise, cough and sore throat. Young children, old people and pregnant women are more at risk at contracting this virus. In India, both seasonal and avian influenza have been reported.
