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Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases

The NHLBI is one of the founding members of the Global Alliance for Chronic Disease (GACD), launched on June 15, 2009, in Seattle, Washington. Composed of national health research institutions, the alliance coordinates and supports research activities that address, on a global scale, the prevention and treatment of chronic non-communicable diseases, which account for nearly 60 percent of all deaths globally. The alliance’s multicountry, multidisciplinary research will focus in particular on the needs of low- and middle- income countries – where 80 percent of deaths from chronic diseases occur – and on those of low-income populations of more developed countries.

The formation of the GACD brings to fruition a global commitment to increase the resources and attention to chronic noncommunicable diseases, which are causing a growing rate of illness, disability, and premature death every year. The GACD is the first collaboration of major research funding agencies to specifically address chronic noncommunicable diseases. Together, the members of the alliance represent an estimated 80 percent of all public health research funding worldwide.

NHLBI Director Elizabeth Nabel (USA) and leaders from the world's top health research agencies formed the Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases on June 14, 2009. Standing, left to right: Depei Liu (China), Warwick Anderson (Australia), Abdallah Daar (University of Toronto), Stig Pramming (Oxford Health Alliance), and Leszek Borysiewicz (UK). Seated with Dr. Nabel: Alain Beaudet (Canada). (Kevin P. Casey for the Global Alliance)"

Member organizations are:

• Australia’s National Health Medical Research Council*
• Canadian Institutes of Health Research*
• China’s Ministry of Health in association with the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences*
• The U.K.’s Medical Research Council *
• The U.S.’s National Institutes of Health*, specifically its National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), the Fogarty International Center (FIC), and the National Institute of Mental Health
• The Indian Medical Research Council*
• The Medical Research Council of South Africa
• The National Biomedical Research Institute (Q-BRI) fo the State of Qatar

(* indicates founding member)


Partner organizations include:

• Pan American Health Organization, Chronic Disease Prevention and Control Department
• World Heart Federation
• National Institute of Medical Research, Tanzania

In addition, the World Health Organization is represented on the alliance board by an official observer.

The GACD is a public-private partnership that plans to facilitate collaborative funding activities for innovative, original research directed at the prevention and treatment of chronic diseases, namely:

• Cardiovascular diseases (mainly heart disease and stroke)
• Several cancers
• Chronic respiratory conditions
• Type 2 diabetes
• Mental illnesses

In November 2009 at the alliance's inaugural scientific summit in New Delhi, the GACD agreed upon the following initial priority areas to:

• Lower hypertension (high blood pressure)
• Reduce tobacco use
• Reduce indoor pollution caused by crude cooking stoves in developing countries.

The GACD members also agreed that the research should:

• Involve local policymakers from the outset, with a commitment to scale up successfully tested programs
• Measure clinical outcomes – for example, a reduction in the incidence of stroke, not just a drop in the incidence of hypertension
• Ensure that human and other resources are not diverted from local health care systems
• Create a toolkit to be used later to scale up and replicate successfully tested programs
• Include a training / capacity building component.

Other activities will include:

• A plan to commission several scoping initiatives to prepare future joint research into obesity and diabetes.
• Sponsorship of a program to identify the world’s “Grand Challenges in Mental Health” and expansion of the GACD's original mandate to include mental illnesses, including suicide, eating disorders, and alcoholism, as a group of chronic noncommunicable diseases that must be addressed globally.
• Designation of Canada’s International Development Research Centre to host the GACD secretariat.

The GACD's next scientific and Board meeting will be hosted by the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences in 2010.

To learn more about the GACD, please visit www.gafcd.org. See also:

• Powerful World Alliance of Health Researchers Announces Landmark Pact on Priorities In Fight Against Humanity’s Most Fatal Diseases , Nov. 16, 2009
• Six of the World’s Foremost Health Research Agencies Form Alliance to Curb Humanity’s Most Fatal Diseases, June 15, 2009.
• Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases News Coverage

See also Fact Sheet

Last Updated: November 16, 2009