For this call, 3 million euros will be awarded for clinical trials (with a maximum of 1,5 million per project) and translational projects (with a maximum of 500 000 euros per project).

  Introduction- The Fight Kids Cancer programme is an exciting venture supported by three European NGO's that have joined forces to launch an opportunity to support academic research for paediatric cancers.  Our vision is to cure all children and adolescents with cancer through the development of better targeted and less toxic therapies. Fight Kids Cancer's mission will be to catalyse and accelerate European research that results in innovative and impactful new therapies that improve the outcome for all children and adolescents with cancer. This second call will offer a total of 3 million euros to support the best clinical and translational research projects that accelerate therapeutic innovation for children and adolescents with cancer.

  Call Objectives- The Fight Kids Cancer programme (hereafter "FKC") aims to catalyse and support pan-European innovative and relevant research initiatives in paediatric cancer to develop innovative research that improves the outcome for all children and adolescents with cancer. This call will cover the following non-exclusive themes: 1) To realise real impact on young patients: Improve survival rate & reduce toxicity to restore young patients to full health after treatment; 2) To produce cutting-edge science to advance knowledge of paediatric malignancies; 3) To support improved interdisciplinary knowledge, methods and collaborations for tackling the issues of today; 4) To strengthen collaboration and the development of scientific capacity across Europe.

This call aims to prioritise areas that will effectively benefit young patients by:

- improving their survival rate

- improving their quality of life during and after the treatments

- improving our knowledge on cancer causes and treatment resistance

The FKC call for projects aims towards overcoming the structural lack of research dedicated to paediatric cancers by ensuring a recurring endowment that will be granted to the best European research projects every year. An additional ambition is to foster closer working ties between basic researchers and clinicians.

Call Options- Projects are expected to propose research on either Early phase clinical trials or Translational research. Applicants to both categories are encouraged to address innovative interventions or approaches towards novel treatment (such as innovative drugs, artificial intelligence, imaging, radiotherapy, surgical approaches...) 

The two categories of projects are:

1.  Early phase clinical trials into evaluating innovative therapies for children and adolescents with cancer addressing either haematological malignancies, solid paediatric and adolescent cancers.

Documentation for provision of investigational drug(s) must be provided

Demonstration that the trial is conducted and financed in at least 2 European countries

Co-funding of clinical trials is possible, however precise details, justification and timeline must be provided

Enrolment of patients must commence not later than 12 months from the start of funding

2. Translational research projects addressing either haematological malignancies, solid paediatric and adolescent cancers. Proposals are encouraged on:

Projects identifying novel mechanisms of action

Projects that may result in innovative new therapies or better models of disease.

Pre-clinical projects including high-risk / high return proposals,

Projects that leverage paediatric tumour models, will be considered.

Multi-disciplinary or multi-institution collaborations are strongly encouraged.

Eligibilty- Funding is aimed at supporting new research projects across Europe. The lead institution must be from the list of eligible countries, with preference given to institutions with a strong track record in paediatric cancer research. Other project partners are encouraged and can be from related fields of expertise, providing they operate as not-for-profit. See Guidance for Applicants for details.

Eligible countries included are: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom.

Deadlines- A two-stage proposal process will apply, with an expression of interest submitted early December 2020. Only those proposals selected by the Programme Committee will be invited to go forward to prepare a full proposal which will close mid-March 2021.

Announcement of the call: 30 September 2020

Close of Expression of Interest via online submission portal: 06 December 2020, 17:00 CET (UTC+1)

Deadline for full-proposals submission: 15 March 2021, 17:00 CET (UTC+1)

Evaluation- The evaluation process will maintain a separation of the project types. Notably the second stage evaluation will be composed of two evaluation panels, one to handle Clinical Trial proposals and the second one for Translational proposals. The research proposals will be evaluated across the following criteria:

Stage 1:  the FKC programmed committee will carry out: (i) a basic eligibility check and (ii) fit to the scope of the call;

Stage 2: an independent expert review will report on (i) excellence; (ii) quality and efficiency of the implementation and (iii) impact (including societal / policy relevance and approaches to stakeholder engagement).

Funding- For this call, 3 million euros will be awarded for clinical trials (with a maximum of 1,5 million per project) and translational projects (with a maximum of 500 000 euros per project).

In case of interest, please contact lnorton(ELIMINAR)@fsjd.org