The Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND) is a global health non-profit based in Geneva, Switzerland. FIND functions as a product development partnership, engaging in active collaboration with over 150 partners to facilitate the development, evaluation, and implementation of diagnostic tests for poverty-related diseases. The organisation's Geneva headquarters are in

Campus Biotech The Campus Biotech is a Switzerland, Swiss institution hosting research institutes and biotechnology companies. The Campus Biotech is located in the former Merck Serono building, in Geneva (Switzerland). The Campus Biotech is a part of the Swi ...

. Country offices are located in

New Delhi, India New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...

;

Cape Town, South Africa Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislature, legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the sec ...

; and Hanoi, Viet Nam.

History

FIND was launched at the 56th

World Health Assembly The World Health Assembly (WHA) is the forum through which the World Health Organization (WHO) is governed by its 194 member states. It is the world's highest health policy setting body and is composed of health ministers from member states. T ...

in 2003 in response to the critical need for innovative and affordable diagnostic tests for diseases in low- and middle-income countries. The initiative was launched by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and WHO's Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR), and its initial focus was to speed up the development and evaluation of tuberculosis tests. In 2011, FIND was recognized as an "Other International Organization" by the Swiss Government, alongside DNDi and

Medicines for Malaria Venture Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV), a not-for-profit public-private partnership, was established as a foundation in Switzerland in 1999. Its mission is to reduce the burden of malaria in disease-endemic countries by developing and facilitating t ...

Priorities

The organization focuses on improving diagnosis in several disease areas, including

hepatitis C Hepatitis C is an infectious disease caused by the hepatitis C virus (HCV) that primarily affects the liver; it is a type of viral hepatitis. During the initial infection people often have mild or no symptoms. Occasionally a fever, dark urine, a ...

HIV The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of ''Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the immune ...

malaria Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects humans and other animals. Malaria causes symptoms that typically include fever, tiredness, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death. S ...

neglected tropical diseases Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) are a diverse group of tropical disease, tropical infections that are common in low-income populations in Developing country, developing regions of Africa, Asia, and the Americas. They are caused by a variety ...

(

sleeping sickness African trypanosomiasis, also known as African sleeping sickness or simply sleeping sickness, is an insect-borne parasitic infection of humans and other animals. It is caused by the species ''Trypanosoma brucei''. Humans are infected by two typ ...

Chagas disease Chagas disease, also known as American trypanosomiasis, is a tropical parasitic disease caused by ''Trypanosoma cruzi''. It is spread mostly by insects in the subfamily ''Triatominae'', known as "kissing bugs". The symptoms change over the cou ...

leishmaniasis Leishmaniasis is a wide array of clinical manifestations caused by parasites of the trypanosome genus ''Leishmania''. It is generally spread through the bite of phlebotomine sandflies, ''Phlebotomus'' and ''Lutzomyia'', and occurs most freq ...

buruli ulcer Buruli ulcer () is an infectious disease characterized by the development of painless open wounds. The disease is limited to certain areas of the world, most cases occurring in Sub-Saharan Africa and Australia. The first sign of infection is a s ...

), and

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease usually caused by '' Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms, in ...

. Alongside this, FIND works on diagnostic connectivity,

antimicrobial resistance Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) occurs when microbes evolve mechanisms that protect them from the effects of antimicrobials. All classes of microbes can evolve resistance. Fungi evolve antifungal resistance. Viruses evolve antiviral resistance. ...

, acute febrile illness, and outbreak preparedness. To support this work, FIND engages in development of target product profiles, maintains clinical trial platforms, manages specimen banks, negotiates preferential product pricing for developing markets, and creates and implements trainings and lab strengthening tools. In 2020, FIND became a co-convener of the Diagnostics Pillar of the

Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator The Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator (ACT Accelerator or ACT-A), or the ''Global Collaboration to Accelerate the Development, Production and Equitable Access to New COVID-19 diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines'', is a G20 initiative annou ...

with

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (or simply the Global Fund) is an international financing and partnership organization that aims to "attract, leverage and invest additional resources to end the epidemics of HIV/AIDS, ...

. Together they supported the development of reliable rapid antigen tests for COVID-19, and guaranteed access to 120 million rapid tests at an affordable price to low- and middle-income countries. FIND also aims at improving the diagnostics ecosystem by working on activities such as

sequencing In genetics and biochemistry, sequencing means to determine the primary structure (sometimes incorrectly called the primary sequence) of an unbranched biopolymer. Sequencing results in a symbolic linear depiction known as a sequence which succ ...

, managing a

biobank A biobank is a type of biorepository that stores biological samples (usually human) for use in research. Biobanks have become an important resource in medical research, supporting many types of contemporary research like genomics and personalize ...

network to facilitate diagnostic development across diseases, helping countries optimize their networks of diagnostic services, and developing digital tools, such as algorithms, that can help healthcare workers provide better diagnosis.

Recent achievements

From 2015 to 2020, fifteen new diagnostic technologies supported by FIND received regulatory clearance, and 10 of them were in use by the end of 2020 in low- and middle-income countries. One example of such tests is Abbott's BIOLINE HAT 2.0, a rapid test for

African trypanosomiasis African trypanosomiasis, also known as African sleeping sickness or simply sleeping sickness, is an insect-borne parasitic infection of humans and other animals. It is caused by the species ''Trypanosoma brucei''. Humans are infected by two typ ...

, a disease also known as sleeping sickness. In 2021 Abbott donated 450,000 of these tests to scale up testing in low- and middle-income countries. Over the same period, FIND supported the development of four multi-disease diagnostic platforms: * Cepheid's

GeneXpert MTB/RIF The Xpert MTB/RIF is a cartridge-based nucleic acid amplification test (NAAT) for simultaneous rapid tuberculosis diagnosis and rapid antibiotic sensitivity test. It is an automated diagnostic test that can identify ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis' ...

for simultaneous rapid tuberculosis diagnosis and rapid antibiotic sensitivity test * Eiken's

LAMP Lamp, Lamps or LAMP may refer to: Lighting * Oil lamp, using an oil-based fuel source * Kerosene lamp, using kerosene as a fuel * Electric lamp, or light bulb, a replaceable component that produces light from electricity * Light fixture, or li ...

platform for the detection of diseases including tuberculosis, malaria, sleeping sickness and leishmaniasis * Molbio's

Truenat Truenat is a chip-based, point-of-care, rapid molecular test for diagnosis of infectious diseases. The technology is based on the Taqman RTPCR (Real Time Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction) chemistry which can be performed on the port ...

, a point-of-care rapid molecular test for diagnosis of infectious diseases * DCN's Fluoro rapid test for gonorrhoea In April 2020, the

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution states its main objective as "the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of h ...

launched the ACT-Accelerator partnership, a global collaboration to accelerate the development, production and equitable distribution of vaccines, diagnostics and therapeutics for

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. Leading the diagnostic pillar together with

, FIND has worked to enable access to tests by boosting research and development, Emergency Use Listing, independent assessment, and manufacturing of tests. Together with partners FIND has developed and made available online courses and training packages for healthcare workers on COVID-19 testing. FIND has also created a portal to provide an overview of the COVID-19 testing landscape, including a directory of COVID-19 diagnostics commercialized., and a tracker centralizing all the data reported by the countries on COVID-19 tests performed, incidence, deaths and positivity rate.

Funding and leadership

FIND receives its funding from more than thirty donors, including bilateral and multilateral organizations as well as private foundations. Members of the Board of Directors include

Ilona Kickbusch Ilona Kickbusch (born 27 August 1948) is a German political scientist best known for her contribution to health promotion and global health. She is adjunct professor at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva. Ear ...

George F. Gao Gao Fu (; born 15 November 1961), also known as George Fu Gao, is a Chinese virologist and immunologist. He has served as Director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention from August 2017 to July 2022 and Dean of the Sava ...

David L. Heymann David L. Heymann (born 1946) is an American infectious disease epidemiologist and public health expert, based in London. Early life and education Heymann was born in Pennsylvania, USA. He received his Bachelor of Arts from Pennsylvania State ...

Shobana Kamineni Shobana Kamineni is an Indian business executive and the executive vice-chairperson of Apollo Hospitals. Early and personal life Kamineni is the daughter of Prathap C. Reddy, the founder and chair of Apollo Hospitals. She has three sisters ...

and Sheila Tlou.

References

{{authority control Biomedical research foundations Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Foundations based in Switzerland Organizations established in 2003 International medical and health organizations Tropical diseases Organisations based in Geneva