The ZincField network
In an effort to combat acute diarrhoea, the second leading cause of mortality in children under the age of five, Nutriset launched the ZincField network in 2009, with two partners manufacturing the product ZinCfant® 20mg dispesrsible tablets in Ethiopia and Tanzania.
Diarrhoea: second leading cause of death in children under 5
Affecting 2.5 billion children annually, acute diarrhoea kills over 2.7 million people every year – predominantly children under the age of five. An effective treatment now exists: dispersible zinc sulfate tablets, such as ZinCfant 20mg®, used in combination with oral rehydration salts (ORS). Recommended by WHO and UNICEF since 2004 and included in WHO’s list of essential medicines since 2005, these tablets remain under-used.
Increasing the access and availability of paediatric zinc tablets
The availability of a high-quality supply on an international scale remains one of the major constraints. Of an estimated twenty producers of dispersible zinc tablets worldwide, only Nutriset / LP Rodael and two other groups have been approved and listed as preferred suppliers of UNICEF.
Having launched the development of dispersible zinc tablets following a request by the WHO, Nutriset and its pharmaceutical partner LP Rodael, have fully mastered the production process and are the only manufacturers to effectively mask the taste of zinc, something that is deemed essential to facilitate the product's administration and uptake in young children.
LP Rodael continues to work to increase its production capacity of the product ZinCfant 20mg® – 550 million tablets per year in 2009, making it possible to treat 55 million children – but regulatory and customs constraints delay or prevent imports of ZinCfant 20mg® into numerous countries with high prevalence and mortality rates associated with acute diarrhoea, such as Ethiopia (500,000 deaths per year), the Sudan, Myanmar, or Guatemala.
Nutriset continues with its efforts to register the product ZinCfant 20mg® in priority countries and to promote the introduction of the zinc + ORS in humanitarian programmes, health centres and within the private sector. To facilitate this strategy, Nutriset and LP Rodael have begun a pre-qualification process for ZinCfant 20mg® with the WHO.
A network for quality at affordable prices
In parallel, Nutriset therefore went further by adapting the PlumpyField® model for the production of ZinCfant 20mg® in 2009 and launched the ZincField network. The forging of partnerships with pharmaceutical companies to share its technology and manufacture the product directly in countries or regions with the greatest needs will serve to increase the availability of high-quality zinc tablets at affordable prices, thus making them more accessible.
The first two members of the ZincField network are located in Ethiopia (East African Pharmaceuticals, or EAP) and Tanzania (Zenufa Laboratories). Both partners are in the process of registering their products with their respective nationale authorities and large scale production is scheduled to commence in early 2012. Discussions are ongoing with potential partners in other priority countries/regions that experience high rates of morbidity and mortality associated with acute diarrhoea and based on statistics provided by UNICEF and the WHO.
