MRFF – Coronavirus Research Response – 2021 COVID-19 Treatment Access and Public Health Activities Grant Opportunity (GO ID: GO5208)
The MRFF – Coronavirus Research Response – 2021 COVID-19 Treatment Access and Public Health Activities Grant Opportunity will support Australian medical research and medical innovation projects that:
- Stream 1: evaluate the safety, effectiveness, feasibility and comparative effectiveness of implementing new treatments for COVID-19 in Australian clinical settings.
- Stream 2: accelerate the development of antiviral candidates to prevent or treat SARS-CoV-2. Research proposals in this stream must focus on one of the following topics:
- Topic A: pre-clinical testing of novel antiviral candidates for stability, safety and effectiveness against SARS-CoV-2 to demonstrate proof of concept.
- Topic B: clinical trials (up to and including phase II) of promising novel antiviral candidates, to enable progression through regulatory pathways and/or transition to commercialisation.
- Topic C: clinical trials (up to and including phase II) to investigate repurposing of existing TGA-approved therapeutics that show promise as antiviral candidates against SARS-CoV-2, to enable progression through regulatory pathways and/or transition to commercialisation.
- Stream 3: characterise the immune response to SARS-CoV-2 variants in children, adolescents, adults and vulnerable populations to improve understanding of how immune responses vary between variants and across cohorts and populations.
- Stream 4: generate knowledge of how SARS-CoV-2 is transmitted through air to inform new and/or improved models of COVID-19 transmission.
- Stream 5: establish a national linked data platform that integrates relevant existing health data sets for the purposes of strengthening evidence-based public health and health system planning and management for future pandemics.
The intended outcome of the research funded by this grant opportunity is to improve the health and wellbeing of Australians by:
- Stream 1: supporting the real time implementation of safe and effective COVID-19 treatments into the Australian health care system and reducing the risk of introducing infection in hospitals and other health care settings.
- Stream 2: accelerating the availability of effective antiviral candidates to treat Australians infected with SARS-CoV-2.
- Stream 3: improving understanding of how immune responses to COVID-19 vary between SARS-CoV-2 variants and across cohorts and populations to inform disease prediction, diagnosis and treatment pathways.
- Stream 4: supporting effective planning for future outbreaks through development of new and/or improved models of COVID-19 transmission.
- Stream 5: supporting the rapid development of evidence-based public health measures to strengthen future health emergency and/or pandemic response planning.
This grant opportunity is being administered by NHMRC on behalf of the Australian Government Department of Health.
Further information on the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) is available from the Department of Health’s MRFF website.