Global call to action to tackle world's leading cause of death
Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death globally. Since the start of the pandemic, approximately 18 million people have died of CVD, with the majority from low- and middle-income countries.听
The epidemic of CVD is a global phenomenon, however equitable access to effective therapies continues to be an international challenge. The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated what can be achieved when the world is faced with an acute health problem in urgent need of solutions. In the special feature article, co-published in leading journals and , the authors argue that we must approach the fight against CVD, the world鈥檚 greatest killer, with the same level of gumption.听
Much like we鈥檝e seen with COVID-19, we鈥檙e calling for the global mobilization of researchers, clinicians, industry leaders and policymakers to accelerate discovery, translation and impact in CVD medicine
聽from the University of Sydney,聽Professor Rebecca Ritchie聽from the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (MIPS) and La Trobe University's聽聽who leads the La Trobe Centre for Cardiovascular Biology and Disease Research, have led the call to action through their shared affiliation with the聽聽- Australia鈥檚 peak leadership body for the advancement of heart, stroke and vascular disease research.听
University of Sydney and聽s Professor Figtree, who is also President of the ACvA, said: 鈥淎s we continue to wrestle with the immense challenge of implementing equitable access to established evidence-based treatments for CVD, substantial gaps remain - particularly in low- and middle-income countries.鈥�
鈥淢uch like we鈥檝e seen with COVID-19, we鈥檙e calling for the global mobilization of researchers, clinicians, industry leaders and policymakers to accelerate discovery, translation and impact in CVD medicine.鈥�
Professor Rebecca Ritchie,聽Drug Discovery Biology Theme Leader at MIPS said: 鈥淒eveloping a global approach to transform drug discovery for cardiovascular disease, whilst maintaining efforts towards equitable access to established effective treatments, is an imperative not an option.鈥�
鈥淪ince the start of the pandemic, the extent of collaboration between researchers, industry, government and the community has been unprecedented - let鈥檚 continue the momentum applied to address COVID-19 and commit to taking similar steps in the fight against CVD, the world鈥檚 biggest killer.鈥�
The authors have outlined the most urgent challenges and potential solutions for accelerating drug discovery and translation in the cardiovascular space, along with the next steps required to drive global collaboration to tackle CVD drug solutions.
The international roundtable identified a number of priority areas across how patients are classified beyond the traditional risk factors such as high blood pressure and cholesterol, smoking, lack of physical activity, obesity and comorbidities such as diabetes, for cardiovascular disease. Using this as a platform to discover new biological mechanisms that cause diseases such as heart attack and heart failure and hinder recovery and quality of life, the authors recommend then targeting these mechanisms to develop precision (personalised) medicine for affected patients.
鈥淭he plan is to establish collaborative preclinical and clinical trial networks to enable faster development of new treatments for cardiovascular disease. Together, the international team is now working on progressing these priority areas, engaging with industry, regulatory bodies, governments and the community on a global scale,鈥� said Professor Ritchie.
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Declaration: The authors report grant funding and affiliations with industry. Refer to the paper聽for full details.听