Category: News

Scientists and researchers from the Africa Pandemic Sciences Collaborative network recently travelled to Providence for a high-level exchange with the Brown University Pandemic Center, marking a major step forward in strengthening pandemic preparedness and health security across Africa.  

The visit convened African research leaders alongside global partners to examine the practical architecture of research ecosystems focusing on governance, bio-surveillance, and translating science into policy action before the next health threat emerges.  

The exchange drew on the work of several active consortia within the EPSILON network, each contributing a distinct dimension to the broader challenge of building resilient health security systems on the continent. The delegation to Brown University included: 

• Prof Sheetal Silal, Principal Investigator of the CLEAR-Africa Consortium, which strengthens evidence-based decision-making through epidemiological and economic analysis for epidemic response;  

• Prof Ademola Ajuwon, who leads the SHARPER Consortium, focused on advancing ethical research systems and equitable access to the benefits of research across African health systems;  

• Prof Seydou Doumbia, lead of the SCGRA Consortium, which builds collaborative capacity in genomic surveillance, emerging pathogens, and climate-health interactions; and  

• Allen Mukhwana, Head of Programmes for Strengthening Science Ecosystems at the Science for Africa Foundation. 

Redefining Institutional Architecture: Core Takeaways 

The visit surfaced four main operational insights that directly inform EPSILON’s research management and translation agenda. 

First, The Brown Pandemic Center operates as a university-wide platform rather than a siloed department. Crucially, the Center maintains a strict separation between evidence synthesis and political advocacy – a structural principle that protects scientific credibility while ensuring research remains relevant to policy actors. 

 The delegation also examined the Boston University BEACON Project, which demonstrates that research translation must be a core, funded institutional function rather than an afterthought. BEACON uses hybrid AI-human workflows to triage hundreds of daily informal public health signals — including emerging Lassa fever trends in Nigeria — verifying them through expert review to deliver real-time, actionable intelligence. 

 A third lesson centred on institutionalising what practitioners call “boundary-spanners”: researchers embedded enough in government decision-making to be useful but anchored firmly enough in universities to retain scientific independence. Mechanisms such as academic time-buyouts and funded fellowships make this a sustainable professional track, not an informal arrangement dependent on individual goodwill. 

 Finally, the delegation examined Brown’s community engagement model, in which community partners and faculty co-lead funding applications with equal budget allocations. This provides a concrete institutional template for SHARPER’s objective of shifting research benefit-sharing from individual to community scale. 

 A Strategic Roadmap for Africa 

Unlike Northern pandemic centres anchored in a single workforce, EPSILON’s advantage lies in orchestrating a distributed, multi-country intelligence system across fragmented policy environments. Moving forward, the network is prioritizing a phased implementation strategy: 

In the near term, the priority is to pilot rapid translation and epidemic intelligence units within select EPSILON hubs, and to co-develop a modular research translation toolkit that can be adapted across different country contexts. 

 Over the medium term, the network aims to establish a centralised research intelligence layer linked directly to the Africa CDC and national public health institutes, creating structured pathways for scientific findings to reach and inform policy decisions. 

 The longer-term ambition is to secure diversified, platform-style funding — separate from short-cycle project grants — to sustain a continent-scale pandemic science synthesis platform capable of responding to health threats as they emerge, not after they have arrived. 

 Generating scientific knowledge is necessary but not sufficient. Translating that knowledge into decisions that protect lives requires the governance frameworks, institutional partnerships, and policy-facing infrastructure to act on it — at speed, and at scale. The Brown University visit brought that infrastructure into sharper focus for the EPSILON network. 

Read the full report here: Learning Visit Report: Brown University Pandemic Centre & BEACON Project

In the first week of March 2026, program management representatives from the three Africa Pandemic Sciences Collaborative partners – the Science for Africa Foundation, the Pandemic Sciences Institute at the University of Oxford, and the Mastercard Foundation – convened in Nairobi for a strategic alignment workshop.

Over the past two years, the Collaborative has made significant progress toward its vision of strengthening Africa’s pandemic preparedness capacity. Seven EPSILON research consortia are now active across the continent, bringing together over 30 African universities and research institutions to advance novel research in pandemic and epidemic preparedness. As our partnership has grown and evolved, we came together to reflect on what is working, sharpen how we collaborate, and build a stronger foundation for the next phase of delivery. To this end, the Mastercard Foundation engaged CoCreative – an organisation experienced in supporting large-scale multi-partner collaboratives – to help design and facilitate this process.

It was a fun-filled week of deep collaboration, shared vision and renewed energy around one of the most important missions on the continent – strengthening Africa’s pandemic resilience and building an African-led science and innovation ecosystem. When you are co-creating a continent-wide research ecosystem across diverse countries, cultures and contexts, moments of intentional alignment are essential.

Together, we reflected on the significant progress we have made. At the heart of this work is the emerging generation of African scientists, innovators and health leaders who will shape the continent’s scientific future. Our role is to create the conditions for them to thrive, lead and deliver solutions – multiplying opportunities across biotechnology, epidemiology, data science and beyond.

Weeks like this remind us why co-creation and collaboration matter. We are building something important together, and this week strengthened the foundation that will carry us forward. We leave with sharper clarity on how to work together, and deeper commitment to the scientists and institutions whose work will define Africa’s pandemic preparedness for generations to come.

24-27 November 2025 | Lagos, Nigeria

The Africa Pandemic Sciences Collaborative exists to strengthen Africa’s capacity for pandemic preparedness through evidence-driven decision-making, strong institutions, and learning systems that respond to context. This was a central message highlighted over four days of a workshop that recently took place in Lagos, Nigeria.

Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning (MEAL) leads from all seven EPSILON consortia met in Lagos for a four-day onboarding workshop aimed at strengthening alignment, sharpening shared understanding, and establishing a unified approach to monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning across the Collaborative.

Co-hosted by SHARPER and SPIL-OVA consortia based at the University of Ibadan and Redeemer’s University respectively, the workshop brought together programme managers, workstream leads, and partners from Mastercard Foundation, SFA Foundation, the Pandemic Sciences Institute and a representative from the Africa Oxford Initiative.

The importance of MEAL to the Collaborative

The University of Ibadan’s College of Medicine Provost, Professor Temidayo O. Ogundiran officially welcomed participants to Lagos and delivered the keynote address at the workshop. In his speech, he highlighted the significance of the MEAL function to the success of the Collaborative’s work.

“I am informed that this onboarding workshop has been carefully put together to strengthen all seven EPSILONs and to equip you with the necessary tools and frameworks to track progress, document results, and define learning, plus engage other stakeholders meaningfully. A robust MEAL system is needed to ensure that interventions are timely, decisions are evidenced correctly, progress is measured, and our impact is sustained – it should be rooted in transparency, excellence and shared commitment to deliver on the goals of the Collaborative”, Prof. Ogundiran remarked.

Carol Nuga, Director of Impact at the Mastercard Foundation, highlighted the evolution of the Foundation’s work – from individual scholarships to institutional strengthening, workforce development, and network-building to increase social capital to achieve our shared goals. She emphasised that MEAL is central to realising impact, influencing ecosystems, and ensuring young people benefit from dignified and fulfilling career pathways.

Building shared understanding and operationalisation of the MEAL Function

Over the four-day workshop, participants explored the structure of the Collaborative, the role of MEAL as a cross-cutting function, and the distinction between programme-level implementation by the EPSILONs and the overarching strategy led through wrap-around activities. Sessions reflecting on the Collaborative’s Theory of Change prompted deep discussion on accountability, influence, contextual differences and how MEAL can capture progress in real time.

The workshop also surfaced operational realities – from language diversity and bureaucratic constraints to the need for clear data responsibilities and integrated reporting systems. Demonstrations of the Collaborative’s MEAL tool helped teams understand how indicators, dashboards and learning inputs will be managed across institutions.

A panel on research-to-policy influence underscored the importance of trust, evidence synthesis, and science communication – key capabilities the Collaborative aims to strengthen across EPSILON teams. Additional sessions focused on impact storytelling, responsible communication, and the role of MEAL in shaping narratives of change.

Days three and four focused on translating principles into practice. Teams reviewed indicators at EPSILON and Collaborative levels, explored data flow and responsibilities, and discussed the MEAL tool that will support real-time reporting and learning.

By the final day, participants revisited the Collaborative’s Theory of Change with new clarity, refining their contributions and areas of influence. The workshop closed with a shared commitment to co-creation, continuous learning, and to building MEAL systems that reflect African contexts and strengthen pandemic readiness.

“This meeting has been engaging and packed with a lot of information. But most importantly, it has been useful in clarifying a lot of things, especially at the beginning of our work in the consortia, before activities kick-off and we need to change tack mid-way. I am grateful for this opportunity and go away with a better understanding of what lies ahead of us,” said Purity Wambui, a Programme Lead from the CLEAR-Africa consortium.

Looking Ahead

Across four days, one message rang consistently: this Collaborative is an opportunity to build something transformative – not only for institutions, but for African health systems, scientific ecosystems, and future generations of researchers and policymakers.

The MEAL onboarding workshop did more than align frameworks. It built trust. It clarified roles. It surfaced the complexity and promise of working across contexts, disciplines and expectations. And it reminded participants that the strength of the Collaborative lies in the people driving it.

“Having missed the inception meeting in Nairobi, I am grateful for the opportunity to be a part of this workshop. Before this, I was very confused about the whole Collaborative and how it works. I also had a limited scope to the objectives and goals of the programme. But now, I have a big picture view of what we are trying to do, and how everything fits in together,” said Dr Chinedu Ugwu, a co-lead from the SPIL-OVA consortium.

Together, the Collaborative is laying the groundwork for rigorous science, stronger systems, and evidence that genuinely shapes Africa’s readiness for future epidemics and pandemics.