GENEVA, April 19 (Reuters) - Drugs group Merck KGaG <MRCG.DE> is donating 200 million tablets, worth $80 million, to help combat a parasitic worm disease afflicting millions in Africa, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Thursday. The gift was announced at the start of a two-day U.N.-hosted meeting on more than a dozen neglected tropical diseases which cause debilitating physical and mental effects in as many as 1 billion people worldwide. The WHO said the drugs, which will be given over 10 years, would help tackle schistosomiasis, which affects about 180 million people, most of them children in Africa. Some 650 million people live in areas prone to the disease. About 85 percent of the people with schistosomiasis, which can cause severe anaemia, impair nutritional status and stunt the growth and development of children, live in Africa. Politicians, public health experts and pharmaceutical representatives meeting at the WHO's Geneva headquarters said they were committed to improve tackling often-overlooked diseases such as leprosy and sleeping sickness through more partnerships and coordinated drug-delivery campaigns. Other drugmakers including GlaxoSmithKline <GSK.L>, Novartis <NOVN.VX>, Bayer <VAYG.DE> and Sanofi-Aventis <SASY.PA> have previously donated medicines to treat a range of neglected tropical diseases, the WHO said. Some 280,000 people die from kidney failure and hypertension related to the disease each year, according to the WHO.
