Building momentum for delinked incentives: Key upcoming webinars

Current funding opportunities (most current list is here):

• The AMR Action Fund is now open to proposals for funding of Phase 2 / Phase 3 antibacterial therapeutics. Per its charter, the fund prioritizes investment in treatments that address a pathogen prioritized by the WHO, the CDC and/or other public health entities that: (i) are novel (e.g., absence of known cross-resistance, novel targets, new chemical classes, or new mechanisms of action); and/or (ii) have significant differentiated clinical utility (e.g., differentiated innovation that provides clinical value versus standard of care to prescribers and patients, such as safety/tolerability, oral formulation, different spectrum of activity); and (iii) reduce patient mortality. It is also expected that such agents would have the potential to strongly address the likely requirements for delinked Pull incentives such as the UK (NHS England) subscription pilot and the PASTEUR Act in the US. Submit queries to contact@amractionfund.com.
• INCATE (Incubator for Antibacterial Therapies in Europe) is a newly launched early-stage funding vehicle. Details are still coming into focus, but per comments on 25 Aug 2021 at the BIOCOM conference, their goal is to support ~4 companies per year with about $250k/company. Contact details are on their website (https://www.incate.net/).
• CARB-X recently announced that their existing resources will be reserved to fund their existing portfolio (more than 80 total awards, and counting, as they include contracting from prior rounds). New rounds from CARB-X will occur only after new funding is obtained in 2021.
• It’s not a funder, but AiCuris’ AiCubator offers incubator support to very early stage projects. Read more about it here.
• The Global AMR R&D Hub’s dynamic dashboard (link) summarizes the global clinical development pipeline, incentives for AMR R&D, and investors/investments in AMR R&D.
• In addition to the lists provided by the Global AMR R&D Hub, you might also be interested in my most current lists of R&D incentives (link) and priority pathogens (link).

Upcoming meetings of interest to the AMR community (most current list is here):

• [NEW] 20 Oct 2021 (virtual, 1-2p US East Coast): National Academies webinar on the public release of their report entitled “Combating Antimicrobial Resistance and Protecting the Miracle of Modern Medicine.” Go here to register. 
• [UPDATED with link to report] 22 Oct 2021 (virtual, 3:30 PM CET/9:30 AM ET): CARB-X webinar entitled “European Celebration of 5 Years of Progress with CARB-X: A virtual discussion of progress and plans to accelerate innovation globally.” Don’t be thrown by the word ‘European’ in the title as the implications here are global: the Year 5 CARB-X report describes an amazing level of activity including 92 funded projects and 10 Phase 1 starts. Go here to register.
• [NEW] 2 Nov 2021 (virtual, 8-9.30a US East Coast, noon-1.30p London, 1-2.30p Paris, 9-10.30p Tokyo): Pfizer-sponsored webinar entitled “The Global AMR Crisis: Is the scale of the action matching the scale of the threat?” With speakers including Hanan Balkhy (WHO), Ramanan Laxminarayan (CDDEP), Hon. Yasuhisa Shiozaki (multiple Cabinet-level roles in Japan’s government, Prof. Lothar H. Wieler (President, Robert Koch Institute), David Paterson (Director, U Queensland Centre for Clinical Research), Kevin Outterson (CARB-X), and me, this event will (i) discuss how the right incentives can simultaneously stimulate both improved patient access as well as innovation in anti-infectives and (ii) provide practical frameworks to support implementation of national action plans. Don’t miss this one! Go here to register!
• 15-17 Nov 2021 (virtual, timings TBD but would expect global coverage): 3rd Call to Action on Antimicrobial Resistance: “Sharing evidence and best practice to empower national action.”
  • Building on the success of the previous Call to Action on Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) conferences held in Berlin (2017) and Ghana (2018), the governments of Denmark, Colombia, Ghana and Zambia, with the International Centre for AMR Solutions (ICARS), UN Foundation, UNICEF, and the Wellcome Trust, are together organising a follow-up event to advance the response to rising rates of drug-resistant infections.
  • Go here for an expression of interest form; contact the organizers at AMRCalltoAction@wellcome.org for other details.
• 18-24 Nov 2021: World Antimicrobial Awareness Week (WAAW), sponsored by WHO. The theme is “Spread awareness, stop resistance.” Go here for details.
• 3 Dec 2021 (Boston, in person, 9a-6.30p, COVID vaccination required): 8th annual BAARN (Boston Area Antimicrobial Research Network) meeting. Go here for details; registration link is here.
• 3 Dec 2021 (virtual, US daytime timings): Symposium entitled “Advances in Antibacterial Discovery” sponsored by the St. Jude Department of Chemical Biology and Therapeutics, is a part of the broader Bringing Chemistry to Medicine series and is supported by the St. Jude T32 Infectious Disease Therapeutics training program. Go here for details and to register.
• 3-6 Mar 2022 (Albuquerque, New Mexico): Biannual meeting of the MSGERC (Mycoses Study Group Education and Research Consortium). Details are here.
• 6-11 Mar 2022 (Il Ciocco, Tuscany): Gordon Research Conference entitled “New Antibacterial Discovery and Development”. Go here for details, go here for the linked 5-6 Mar Gordon Research Seminar that precedes it.
• 7-8 Apr 2022 (Basel and in person, we hope): The 6th edition of the annual AMR conference sponsored by the BEAM Alliance, CARB-X, the Novo REPAIR Impact Fund, the IMI Accelerator, and the European Biotechnology Network. Go here for the hold-the-date page and a way to be kept informed about the meeting. 
• 9-13 May 2022 (Athens and online): 40th Annual Meeting of the European Society for Paediatric Infectious Diseases, Go here for details.
• 20-24 Sep 2022 (New Delhi): 21st Congress of the International Society for Human and Animal Mycology (ISHAM). Go here for details.
• 25-28 Oct 2022 (Stellenbosch, South Africa): The University of Cape Town’s H3D Research Centre will celebrate its 10th anniversary with a symposium covering the Centre’s research on Malaria, TB, Neglected Tropical Diseases, and AMR. Go here to register.