PLOS NTDs celebrates our 10th anniversary: Looking forward to the next decade.

PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases (PLOS NTDs) has celebrated its 10th anniversary! Under the exceptional leadership and guidance of Peter Hotez, Founding Editor, the journal was established in 2007 as a platform for research and advocacy for NTDs, a group of chronic endemic infections that largely affect poor populations in often unseen areas of the world—forgotten diseases of forgotten people. Since 2007, there has been tremendous change in the field of NTDs, with a renewed interest in and commitment to reducing the impact of these devastating diseases affecting billions of individuals living in the most marginalized communities. In addition to the seven NTDs originally targeted by preventive chemotherapy (three soil-transmitted helminth infections, schistosomiasis, lymphatic filariasis [LF], onchocerciasis, and trachoma), visceral leishmaniasis and food-borne trematode infections have been recognized as priority diseases. Viral diseases, including dengue and rabies, have also emerged as important public health challenges in many of these populations. While often considered diseases of resource-limited countries, the "blue marble health" concept has also emerged, recognizing the paradoxical NTD disease burden among the poor living in Group of Twenty (G20) nations and other wealthy countries, further supporting the need for these nations to take greater ownership in disease control as well as research and development. Increased attention among policy makers, funders, and the public to the importance of these infections has attracted new scientific and financial resources towards research and product development for these poverty-promoting diseases.