The announcement of Roberto Speranza resembles the “market coup” in football: on a mission to the United States, the Minister of Health announced that the immunologist Anthony Fauci («One of the main personalities in the world in the fight against the pandemic») has given his willingness to collaborate with the unborn Biotecnopolo di Siena, an Italian hub against pandemics based in the laboratories and buildings where Toscana Life Sciences is already located. A good start for a foundation born with a Democratic Party-branded amendment to the latest budget law but accompanied by some controversy.
Anti-pandemic hub
The Biotecnopolo di Siena is a foundation that “carries out functions of promotion and coordination of study, research, technical-scientific development and technology transfer and innovative processes, starting from those persistent in the Sienese ecosystem of the sciences of vita “and will have the role of” anti-pandemic hub, also making use of spoke centers and sequencing networks of viral pathogens, for the research, development and production of vaccines and monoclonal antibodies for the treatment of emerging epidemic-pandemic diseases “.
Resources: funds from the NRP for 340 million euros
The Sienese foundation starts with funds of 21 million in the two-year period (9 million euros in 2022, 12 million for 2023) and then 16 million a year from 2024. The anti-pandemic hub functions will be financed with resources from the NRP within the limit of 340 million euros in total.
The statute (to be approved) and the founders
The founders are four ministries: Economy and Finance, University and Research, Health and Economic Development. They are responsible for supervising the foundation. The amendment instituted by the Biotecnopolo also provides that the Statute be approved “within ninety days from the date of entry into force” of the budget law. The deadline was not met.
The statute must also regulate the methods of collaboration or participation in the foundation of public and private entities, including, in particular, the Toscana Life Sciences Foundation (Tls), which has its headquarters in Siena. It is a regional non-profit organization that has been operating since 2005 with the aim of supporting research activities in the field of life sciences and, in particular, to support the development of projects from basic research to industrial application. Among the founding members are the Tuscany Region, the Mps Bank and Foundation, the local Sienese institutions, the Universities of Florence, Pisa and Siena and the
Higher education schools Sant’Anna and Normale in Pisa.