LA Times on Artemesin

Historically, vaccines have been responsible for reining in some of the world's worst diseases. In an earlier editorial, we urged the United States and other wealthy nations to speed progress by committing in advance to a $4-billion purchasing fund, to be tapped only if an effective vaccine is developed. This innovative, market-based complement to the "push" of grants would "pull" more biotech firms and their armies of scientists into the search by guaranteeing a payoff for success.But sub-Saharan Africa's dying children can't wait years for a vaccine. Here too the world's wealthy nations can help, by creating a similar fund to pay for an exciting but expensive drug compound made from a Chinese herb... What is needed is a global purchasing pool, separate from the one proposed to spur investment in vaccine research. Rather than guaranteeing a future market for a potential vaccine, the second fund would be tapped now to pay for an already existing cure.The Washington-based Institute of Medicine, an independent organization that advises the U.S. government on health policy, last year proposed just such a plan. In a report written by a Nobel Prize-winning economist, it called on international organizations and world leaders to contribute $300 million to $500 million a year to a centralized procurement agency to buy ACTs at competitive prices, then resell them at lower prices to public and private distributors in countries battling malaria.