For months, Americans have been hearing about the much-debated health care bill – aka the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act – that was signed into law on March 23rd. We’ve watched President Obama’s return to campaigning, heard about Nancy Pelosi’s long nights, and focused our attention on a handful of issues included in the Act that divide Americans right down the middle. After all of that, how much do you actually know about what is in the bill? Turns out, it contains a lot more than you might think.

FasterCures, a nonprofit think tank that works across sectors and diseases to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of medical research enterprises, held a Forum this past Wednesday to draw attention to a part of the Act – the Cures Acceleration Network – that could make a big difference for neglected diseases.

The Cures Acceleration Network, referred to as CAN, is a provision (Sec. 10409) that aims to repair the drug development pipeline for diseases with languishing pipelines. Because of the lack of commercial drivers that exist for diseases of the poor, product development pipelines for neglected diseases are fundamentally broken. Not enough R&D is happening to produce the volume of viable drug or vaccine candidates to get those products tested, approved, and to market to treat the millions that are suffering on a daily basis.

By establishing a new grant-making entity within the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Act is intended to augment funding currently coming from other government sources, venture philanthropy, and private foundations, among others.

While the primary purpose of the legislation is to address the critical barrier of funding, a key component of the Act drives collaboration between governmental and non-governmental entities. CAN will be governed by a Review Board, which will be comprised of 24 members including representatives from NIH, Defense, Veteran’s Affairs, the National Science Foundation, and the Food & Drug Administration. They will be joined by a number of private sector members representing venture capital, patient advocacy groups, and research. Together the Board members will work to identify critical gaps in pipelines and decide on funding for projects that will provide significant impact.

It should be noted that, while CAN is now “the law of the land,” funds have not yet been appropriated for it. Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA), who initially introduced the Act as part of the 2009 Senate health care bill, is currently rallying members of Congress to secure the full $500 million proposed appropriation.

Finding new ways to foster the type of translational research needed to fill drug development pipelines is a critical step to providing treatment and prevention for diseases that are killing millions around the world. Promising research needs to be accelerated if we are to achieve our goals of delivering new drugs, vaccines, and diagnostics. BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH) would like to join the growing number of organizations urging Congress to appropriate the funds necessary for NIH to move forward with the establishment of CAN.

We’ll learn more about how organizations – academic institutions, venture capitalist firms, product development partnerships, and even Faster Cures – have been working to traverse the “Valley of Death” for neglected disease product development on a panel during our Partnering for Global Health Forum, co-located with the BIO meeting in May. The meeting is just a few weeks away. Register or find out more about the Forum’s program at pgh.bio.org.

Get the latest updates on the Partnering for Global Health Forum by joining the meeting’s LinkedIn group here.

Jennifer Manganello is the Development Association at BVGH.