09/02/2006 (Agence Europe) - “It is vital to strengthen the role of public research, without which no real progress” in the fight against serious, neglected illnesses, like AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis or sleeping sickness can be made, said MEP Umberto Guidoni at a public hearing on neglected diseases organised by his Parliamentary group, the GUE/NGL on 8 February. It was important to effectively establish sustainable and long-term financing systems and to plan for the use of Joint Research Centres in the medical and sanitary sector, said the Partito dei Comunisti Italiani MEP. In spite of medical advances in vaccines, “a strong political willingness to foster this progress” was still lacking, he said as he announced that the GUE/NTL group intended to “contribute to making global health and medicines a strategic sector” and to set R&D priorities in the EU.