I am happy to report that on Friday, December 12, the UNITAID Executive Board approved MPP’s proposal to extend its work on HIV patent licensing to 2020. We are grateful to UNITAID, our founder and sole financial supporter, for its confidence in the MPP as a key implementer of the organisation’s market shaping initiatives.

To date, the MPP has signed agreements for eleven antiretrovirals (ARVs) and one medicine for an opportunistic infection for countries that are home to 88-98% of people living with HIV in low and middle-income countries. Ten generic manufacturers have sub-licensed from the MPP and we are currently managing more than 50 medicine development projects.

With UNITAID’s support, MPP seeks to substantially improve public health outcomes through accelerating access to a range of products, including ARVs licensed in the first-term as well as new medicines coming to market. The MPP also will focus on top development challenges, such as the manufacture of fixed-dose combinations (FDCs) for both adults and children. Finally, as a partner in the UNITAID-launched Paediatric HIV Treatment Initiative, MPP supports the rapid development of new better adapted paediatric HIV medicines for millions of children living with the virus.

Over the next half decade, MPP will continue to work with its partners —including industry — to contribute to the drastic scale-up of HIV treatment. Only by ensuring that all people living with HIV have access to the right medicine at the right price, can we hope to end the epidemic by 2030.

Please see UNITAID’s statement here.