"We have to do something radical and brave"

For humanity’s sake the pharmaceutical industry must work collaboratively, says Dr Chas Bountra, Chief Scientist at the University of Oxford’s Structural Genomics Consortium.

The University of Oxford’s Structural Genomics Consortium operates very differently to most other pharmaceutical organisations: it releases all its data to the public, without any intellectual property protection.

Chief Scientist Chas Bountra explains: “We share all our know-how, reagents, and so on. It is a brilliant way of working with the very best people, and accelerating the drug discovery process.”

Dr Bountra believes it is the only way forward for the industry, and the world. He says: “At the moment, there is massive duplication. Many pharmaceutical companies are working on the same targets, and years later, we still do not know whether those targets work!

“Everyone is doing the same experiments in secret as they are competing against each other and we know from previous experience that 90 per cent of these targets will not work. That is a lot of effort, money, resources and brain power wasted. In addition, unnecessarily testing drugs in people surely cannot be right.

“We are exploring ways in which public and private sectors can work together to do more clinical Proof of Concept studies on novel targets, pre-competitively. If we can achieve this, then I am convinced this will be in the interest of patients, society and industry.

“The fact is, we cannot allow current modus operandi to continue. In 30 or 40 years, some economies will be unable to cope with the cost of caring for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and stroke patients. We urgently need to come up with better treatments. We have to do something radical and brave. “

Read more at “Transforming drug discovery”

Dr Chas Bountra, Chief Scientist at the University of Oxford’s Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC), is Chairman of the marcus evans Discovery Summit 2010 in Cannes, 22 - 24 March 2010