‘Discovery Awards’ closing date nearing

In January, the UK’s chief medical officer Professor Dame Sally Davies announced the launch of the ‘Discovery Awards’ — a seed funding programme to drive innovation in the development of a point-of-care diagnostic to help reduce antibiotic resistance. The closing date for applications for funding will be midnight on 21 April 2017.

The Longitude Prize Discovery Awards programme was started in May 2016 to provide small seed grants of up to £25,000 to help individuals or teams to further develop their ideas to win the prize and to encourage new innovators into the race. This year will see the completion of the second round of funding.

Current trends anticipate that AMR will cause 10 million deaths annually by 2050, so by offering up to £25,000 this programme hopes to assist in the development of rapid tests to diagnose bacterial infections so that the right antibiotics can be administered at the right time.