Call for expansion of European disease research programme

The European Parliament is calling for the proposed European Union programme on AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis research to be expanded to include other diseases found in developing countries. It has adopted amendments allowing the programme's €600m (US$650m) to be spent on clinical trials for drugs treating co-infections of these conditions. The parliament's reporter on the plan, Gerard Caudron MEP, said that although it should focus on these three original diseases, 'it would appear inadvisable to circumscribe such research too narrowly'. Other approved amendments insist that resulting medicines must be accessible to developing countries and also call for the development of existing research as well as funding completely new treatments.