Fast Track Options as a fundraising mechanism to support R&D into Neglected Diseases

The current view is that the financing of R&D for neglected diseases should be provided by the public sector, while R&D itself is best carried out by the private pharmaceutical sector. In response to this model, most current policy proposals are aimed at mobilising substantial public finances to commercialise the neglected disease market, thereby allowing it to compete in company R&D priorities with traditional Western markets. These incentives generally aim to achieve a level of funding sufficient to motivate involvement by large multinational pharmaceutical firms (MNCs), which in practice means a neglected disease R&D incentive needs to match or exceed commercial peak sales of $500 million plus per year.