We hosted an event with Institut Pasteur on neglected diseases, focusing on the successes, challenges, and alternative models of innovation. This event reflected on the past 20 years of innovation and partnerships through a non-profit pharmaceutical research model.

Together with UAEM, DNDi organized an event at Charité showing our film ‘Out of the Shadows’ and including speakers from Médecins Sans Frontières, Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevölkerung, and UAEM Europe.

We hosted an event on ‘Champions of Change’ honouring health workers and kala-azar survivors who supported the national elimination program on World NTD Day 2024 at Sadar Hospital in the Saran district in Bihar. Speaking at the event, Dr Krishna Pandey, director of Rajendra Memorial Research Institute of Medical Sciences (RMRI), Patna, emphasized the need for all stakeholders’ collective action to sustain the kala-azar elimination over the next few years. He said DNDi’s Centres of Excellence for Leishmaniasis in Saran and Purnea districts have made treatment and diagnosis for complicated kala-azar cases, such as PKDL, readily available.

The event was covered in the press by local media outlets.

The World NTD Day Japan Preparatory Committee hosted a webinar bringing together industry, government, and academic institutions working on NTDs in Japan in order to deepen the understanding of NTDs in Japan and to further promote the movement toward elimination by collaborating with partners involved in NTDs.

The event included the first student contest about NTDs where 20 students competed in 11 shortlisted teams on the themes of either ‘Communicate NTDs in an easy-to-understand way’ or ‘Think about what we can do for NTDs’. The contest was planned and organized by the NTDs Youth Organization.

In collaboration with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) East Africa, we hosted a webinar on bridging treatment gaps for NTDs with the goal of elimination. Samuel Kariuki and Simon Bolo spoke about the impact of climate change on the spread of NTDs and DNDi’s work in improving access to treatments.

We were invited by the Murcia Society of Preventive Medicine and Public Health to join their webinar titled ‘Neglected diseases: Global and public health perspective. The example of sleeping sickness’. Olaf Valverde and Terín Beca Martínez presented on the progress made towards the elimination of sleeping sickness.

On February 26, our team also participated at an event on neglected fungal diseases at Real Academia Nacional de Medicina in Spain. The event is co-organized by the academy, Instituto de Salud Carlos III, and Fundación CSAI.

Watch the recording

We participated in a webinar hosted by SILF, the Swedish Society of Tropical Medicine, Doctors Without Borders, and Mediahuset. Sabine Specht presented about new and repurposed drugs for NTDs.

Watch the recording

In London, the UK Coalition against NTDs and APPG on Malaria and NTDs organized an event at the UK Parliament entitled ‘Women, girls, and ending neglected diseases of poverty: Time to Unite, Act, and Eliminate’ highlighting the impact of NTDs on women and girls on World NTD day. Dinu Guruge presented our work on dengue through the Dengue Alliance and the need for global collaboration to eliminate NTDs.