Saturday, January 29, 2011

Global Alliance for Vaccine & Immunization GAVI Raised US$ 66 Million




January 30, 2010 By Robert Graham ---- Phacilitate’s 7th annual Cell & Gene Therapy Forum in Washington DC


While Attending Phacilitate’s 7th annual Cell & Gene Therapy Forum in Washington DC Hybrid Medical Media came up with the New Slogan for Global Alliance for Vaccine & Immunization (GAVI) "Committed to Our Mission with Analytics" Soon After

Bill Gates and ABU DHABI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES on - January 25, 2011: HH General Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces (right) receives Bill Gates, Co-Chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, at the Al Bateen Palace. (Philip Cheung / Crown Prince Court - Abu Dhabi).
US$ 66 million donation from the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for children in Afghanistan

Geneva, 26 January 2011 — A new partnership marking broader global collaboration around vaccines injects needed funding into the GAVI Alliance’s efforts to help save millions of children and hopefully inspires other philanthropists to invest in childhood immunisation programmes.
Private donations like this send a clear signal to our government donors that they are not alone in seeing the value of immunisation.
Dagfinn Høybråten, Chair of the GAVI Alliance board

Announced in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday, His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation entered into a partnership in which each committed US$ 50 million for immunisation programmes in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Of the total US$ 100 million, the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI), will receive US$ 66 million to buy and deliver additional supplies of the five-in-one pentavalent vaccine and to support the introduction of new pneumococcal vaccines in Afghanistan. These vaccines help protect children from the main killers of children under five, including pneumonia, diphtheria, pertussis (whooping cough), tetanus, hepatitis B, Haemophilus influenzae type B (HiB), which causes meningitis.

“Private donations like this send a clear signal to our government donors that they are not alone in seeing the value of immunisation. If we are to fulfill our promise to all children, the GAVI Alliance needs to raise an extra US$ 3.7 billion for immunisation in the run up to 2015. We hope this commitment will inspire all concerned to invest even more to save and protect young lives,” said Dagfinn Høybråten, Chair of the GAVI Alliance board.

Backed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and an increasing number of sovereign governments since its launch in 2000, the GAVI Alliance has succeeded in immunising more than 288 million children, preventing more than five million premature deaths, according to WHO figures.

If fully funded, the GAVI Alliance will be able to immunise an additional 230 million children with pentavalent vaccine by 2015, and protect 90 million children with new pneumococcal vaccines which are already being introduced in the first of more than 40 developing countries. GAVI also plans to introduce vaccines against rotavirus in 33 countries.

The bulk of GAVI’s funds come from 16 sovereign governments and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The GAVI Campaign works to secure funds from private donors and other partners, including Spain’s "la Caixa" Foundation.

“I sincerely hope that other potential donors will recognise this inspired investment as a call to action,” said Paul O’Connell, Chairman of the Campaign. “If you want to provide children with a healthy start in life and enable them to grow up to build strong communities, then immunisation is one of the most cost-effective and proven ways to do it,” he said.

# # #

The GAVI Alliance is a Geneva-based public-private partnership aimed at improving health in the world’s poorest countries. The Alliance brings together developing country and donor governments, the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry in both industrialised and developing countries, research and technical agencies, civil society, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other private philanthropists.

In 2007, the Alliance launched the GAVI Campaign, a U.S. 501(c )(3) public charity fostering robust private sector engagement in support of vaccine programmes in the developing world. For more information on giving opportunities for individuals, foundations, and corporations, please visit

Thursday, January 6, 2011

How President Obama and Congress is helping find a Breast Cancer Cure.



January 15, 2010 By Robert Graham ---- Frontiers in Personalized Medicine: Washington DC



How President Obama and Congress helping find a Breast Cancer Cure.

Genomics Science for Breast Cancer is making real progress with the Science Communities. President Obama 111th Congress Passing H.R.5116 COMPETES Act "America COMPETES Re authorization Act of 2010" and Stand Up to Cancer $15 million grant will help The Science Community Develop A blood test so sensitive that it can spot a single cancer cell lurking among a billion healthy ones is moving one step closer to being available at your doctor's office. A example of this technology:

Hybrid Pharma Panoincell uses Semiconductor Sequencing Chips that create a direct connection between Biochemical and digital information, bringing these two languages together.Hybrid'schips are designed like any other semiconductor chips.

Pairing proprietary semiconductor technology with sequencing chemistry a nucleotide is incorporated into a strand of DNA by a polymerase, a hydrogen ion is released.

Hybrid Pharma used a high-density array of micro-machined wells for bioctechnology process in a massive way. Each well holds a different DNA template. Beneath the wells is an ion-sensitive layer and beneath that a proprietary Ion sensor.

When a nucleotide, is added to a DNA template and is then incorporated into a strand of DNA, a hydrogen ion will be released. The charge from that ion will change the pH of the solution, which can be detected. Hybrid's sequencer—essentially will call the base, going directly from Biochemical information to digital information. The out come is to find the p53, p63 and p73 genes that make up Breast Cancer

Mass General, Sloan-Kettering, University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston will start using the test this year. They are one of the "dream teams" sharing a $15 million grant from the Stand Up to Cancer telethon, run by the American Association for Cancer Research.

H.R.5116 COMPETES Act bioscience research program will support Breast Cancer research and development of standard reference materials, measurements, methods, and genomic and other data to advance—
‘‘(1) biological drug research and development;
‘‘(2) molecular diagnostics;
‘‘(3) medical imaging technologies; and
‘‘(4) personalized medicine.

Fund the creation of bioscience user facility to provide access to advanced or unique equipment, services, materials, and other resources to industry, institutions of higher education, nonprofit organizations, and government agencies to perform research and testing.

Fund POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWS to the extent practicable, assign 1 or more fellows from the postdoctoral fellowship program established in section 19 to the bioscience research program and much much more.

2011 is going to be a Great Year for Breast Cancer.