€9m funding for the multidisciplinary consortium ARPEGE

By combining preventive, diagnostic, therapeutic and economic approaches for the first time the ARPEGE consortium led by SME Antabio has received €9m in public funding from the French government and BPI France. ARPEGE is using a ground-breaking model to provide a framework for innovation and to strengthen the ability of healthcare systems addressing antibiotic resistance.

Pathogens resistant to antibiotics has emerged a growing threat to public health, which is characterized by three significant risks to society:

A strong epidemiological risk, which causes 700,000 deaths per year worldwide. Projections indicate that by 2050, antibiotic resistance could result in up to 10 million deaths per year.
A risk to modern medical practice in particular: chemotherapy, surgery, transplants, and other procedures all depend on the availability of effective antibiotics.
A risk to the world economy, as additional costs for health systems of approximately 100,000 billion dollars per year result from antibiotic resistance.

In this connection, France, among other countries such as Germany, the UK, and the USA, is actively contributing to combat antibiotic resistance. The ARPEGE project received funding by the French government with nearly €9m out of total estimated budget of €17m.

ARPEGE is coordinated by a consortium of four partners committed to fight against antibiotic resistance:

Antabio, the leading partner, is a French SME dedicated to developing therapeutic solutions for infections identified as priorities by the World Health Organization (WHO).
bioMérieux, is a world leader in microbiological in vitro diagnostics that develops solutions to improve patient health and consumer safety.
Hospices Civils de Lyon (HCL), is the second largest French university hospital, jointly with the International Centre for Infectious Disease Research (CIRI), which focuses on understanding, prevention, and treatment of infectious diseases.
Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), is one of the world’s top 10 research and teaching centers in economics, with 150 researchers working alongside Jean Tirole, winner of the 2014 Nobel Prize in Economics.

The ARPEGE consortium provides a special cross-cutting approach in four main areas:

Expanding the arsenal of effective antibiotics, which is essential to ensure improved patient care.
Improving diagnostics utilizing a targeted and informed approach to antibiotic prescription, by a sequencing-based software solution enabling new-generation susceptibility testing to obtain the resistance profile of a specific pathogen.
Preventing bacterial transmission in hospitals through early and automated detection of epidemics and potential at-risk situations.
Developing new economic models capable of sustainably enhancing the value of innovations that are needed in the fight against antibiotic resistance.