Impactful Global Health Collaborations: Merck and the Carter Center's Fight Against Neglected Tropical Diseases

September 2024

For more than 27 years, The Carter Center has partnered with countries throughout Africa and the Americas to achieve remarkable progress in the global fight to eliminate neglected tropical diseases. This work — life-changing for millions of people — has been possible only through the support and partnership of Merck & Co., Inc. (Merck), the Mectizan Donation Program (MDP) and Merck’s Richard T. Clark Fellowship for Global Health.

Since 1996, The Carter Center and MDP have worked together to transform lives and communities.

Developed and manufactured by Merck, Mectizan® (ivermectin) is the only proven, safe, and effective medicine available for treating river blindness (RB). RB, also known as onchocerciasis, is one of the leading causes of preventable blindness worldwide. Caused by a parasite, the infection can create intense itching, skin discoloration, rashes, and eye disease, which often leads to permanent blindness. Mectizan helps to prevent blindness and skin disease in infected persons and stop the transmission of the parasite to others by killing parasitic worm larvae in the human body.

When combined with albendazole, Mectizan is also successful in treating lymphatic filariasis (LF), which is caused by thin parasitic worms transmitted to humans through mosquito bites in tropical and subtropical regions. LF causes periodic fevers and severe swelling in the legs and genitalia. If not treated, it causes elephantiasis, in which there is a permanent, often extreme, enlargement of the limbs and hardening of the skin.

The Mectizan Donation Program has enabled The Carter Center to provide more than 531 million treatments for RB and 195 million treatments for LF to date. And thanks to Merck, The Carter Center, in partnership with local governments and representatives, has helped four countries eliminate the transmission of RB, and three countries eliminate LF as a public health problem — amazing progress that promises to impact millions of more people in the years to come.

Merck’s commitment to global and individual health goes even further. In alignment with the company’s dedication to bringing solutions to global health challenges, Merck’s Richard T. Clark Fellowship for Global Health program helps strengthen the capacity and reach of nongovernmental organization (NGO) partners, like The Carter Center, by providing them with technical and human capital support. The Carter Center is honored to be one of the recipients of this support. Through the fellowship program, Merck colleagues generously donated their time to provide expertise and serve as consultants for the Center’s Guinea Worm Eradication Program in 2022 and 2023.

The Carter Center is a leader in the international campaign to eradicate Guinea worm disease, a parasitic disease caused by the consumption of infected water; it is one of humanity’s oldest afflictions. Working closely with partners, The Carter Center has helped to reduce the incidence of the disease from an estimated 3.5 million cases in 1986 to 14 cases in 2023. Reaching zero human cases as well as zero animal infections presents challenges, both logistical and technical. With support from the Richard T. Clark Fellowship for Global Health, experts from Merck have been on the ground in Chad working with Carter Center staff, the Ministry of Health, and local stakeholders to analyze and provide recommendations geared toward helping the world reach the goal of eradication.

Merck’s Richard T. Clark Fellows — with knowledge and expertise in supply chain management, logistics, sourcing, procurement, and product delivery — completed a comprehensive assessment and provided recommendations that will help streamline and advance supply chain operations. The guidance provided by Merck’s expert staff not only helps to create innovative solutions to current challenges, but is also invaluable to going the final mile to eradicate the ancient and often disabling disease.

The Carter Center’s health programs fill vacuums in global health, helping to prevent needless suffering and build hope for millions. The approach of The Carter Center and its partnership with Merck has created a successful model that will enable the Center to make substantial gains in RB and LF elimination in the years to come, and to achieve President Carter’s goal of eradicating Guinea worm disease. Together, this partnership is accomplishing great feats and making lives better for people across the globe.