Bangladesh hospital wins Gates award

David Sack: Expanding to deal with other infectious diseases

By Alastair Lawson in Dhaka

A research hospital which is spearheading the fight against diarrhoea in Bangladesh has become the first to win a $1m award donated by the owner of Microsoft, Bill Gates.

The Dhaka-based Centre for Health and Population Research beat off competition from around 100 aid agencies and non-governmental organisations from around the world to win the Gates Award for Global Health.

The centre treats around 100,000 patients a year, saving an estimated 15,000 lives.

The centre's director, David Sack, said he was delighted to win the award, which he said would save even more lives in the country.

Outbreaks of diarrhoea still take place on a seasonal basis

Around 80% of the patients treated by the organisation every month - often at minimal cost - are children.

All patients who enter the centre's hospital are treated free of charge.

They receive an oral re-hydration solution which Mr Sack says has been sent to other developing countries, saving around three million lives a year.

Mr Sack says that the solution has been so successful that the main battle against diarrhoea in Bangladesh is now won, even though outbreaks still take place on a seasonal basis.

Big ideas

"Certainly we do not have the situation where large numbers of people are dying of diarrhoea any more. However we do need to work more at prevention," the centre's director said.

"We still have problems with water sanitation, and we're doing a lot of work trying to explain why we have this seasonality of certain infections," he added.

Mr Sack said the centre in Dhaka was expanding to deal with other infectious diseases, family planning and nutritional issues.

He said recently laboratories at the centre were at the forefront in tackling diseases and illnesses in the third world.

Mr Sack said that because the centre always had ideas bigger than its budget, the prize money provided by the Gates Foundation would soon be spent.

It is not clear whether more money might be forthcoming - but the Gates foundation has an asset base of over $20bn.