(Vienna, 29 January 2025) Two MedUni Vienna research initiatives have been awarded the “Creating Possible Award”. The prizes are awarded by Gilead Sciences Austria to outstanding research and community projects that play and will continue to play a significant and sustainable role in the treatment of infectious diseases and PBC (primary biliary cholangitis). Mathias Jachs and Thomas Szekeres were honored.
Infectious diseases are not only a seasonal problem and go far beyond the common cold symptoms and flu-like infections that are quickly cured. As disease progression can sometimes be severe and treatment options reach their limits depending on the disease and patient - despite evidence-based medical research - Gilead Sciences initiated the annual “Creating Possible Award” (CPA) in 2022. This enables sophisticated research groups to make their contribution to the diagnosis and treatment of specific diseases, supports patients during therapy on many levels and also promotes community projects that contribute to destigmatizing HIV, for example.
Five promising projects
This year's winning projects are characterized by their versatility and cover the broad spectrum of infectiology - from viral hepatitis and HIV to COVID-19 and primary biliary cholangitis (PBC).
Two of the winning projects are being carried out at the Medical University of Vienna: Mathias Jachs with “Creating possibilities in HBV/HDV coinfection” to identify undetected hepatitis D cases using prospective double-reflex testing, and Thomas Szekeres for the development of a new broad-spectrum antiviral therapy for the treatment of Sars-CoV-2, RSV, influenza A and B infections.
With the “SEXGESUND - Selbstcheck” project, Manfred Rupp from AIDS-Hilfe Steiermark aims to reduce the late diagnosis of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) using self-test kits; Lukas Burghart (Ottakring Clinic) is pursuing the goal of better controlling the disease activity of PBC through optimized therapy with his “PBC-ReCall” project. Angelika Widhalm from Hepatitis Hilfe Österreich/Plattform Gesunde Leber (HHÖ) was also presented with an award for setting up an ongoing rapid test program in pharmacies to detect viral hepatitis.
A total of almost 125,000 euros will be awarded this year, which will be used to implement the winning projects and improve both diagnosis and treatment.