The Intellectual Property & Science division of Thomson Reuters has announced the publication of a new study tracking the current status of research on neglected tropical diseases. The Global Research Report Neglected Tropical Diseases analyses research output across countries and fields from 1992-2011 and finds a two-fold increase in published literature focused on a group of diseases identified by the World Health Organization as underserved by public health services. Despite these recent gains, however, the total research output is still significantly less than that of ‘first world’ diseases.
Though the analysis finds that research output focused on neglected tropical diseases has doubled from roughly 2,500 papers in 1992 to well over 5,000 papers in 2011, these totals still pale in comparison to other diseases such as cancer (85,000 papers), HIV/AIDS (16,000 papers) and coronary artery disease (15,000 papers). To put this in context, more than one billion people are infected with one or more neglected tropical diseases and more than half a million die each year from their infections, compared with about 35 million globally who are infected with HIV or the 346 million afflicted with diabetes.
In addition to the aggregate bibliographic analysis, Thomson Reuters also reviewed research output by region and individual disease and suggests strategies for fostering increased neglected tropical disease focus.
Data for this report was drawn from the Web of Science database, available on the Thomson Reuters Web of Knowledge platform. The database covers over 100 years of research in more than 12,000 of the highest impact journals, and over 150,000 conference proceedings records from around the world.
