Research Area

Epidemic and pandemic public health policy research

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Lead Institution

University of Sciences, Techniques and Technologies of Bamako, Mali (Professor Seydou Doumbia)

The Partners

Africa Center of Excellence for the Prevention and Control of Communicable Diseases, Guinea (Professor Alexandre Delamou), College of Medicine and Allied Sciences, University of Sierra Leone (Dr Alhaji N’jai), Félix Houphouët Boigny University, Côte d’Ivoire (Professor Petronille Acray-Zengbe), Global Alliance for Preventing Pandemics, USA (Dr J Kenneth Wickiser), University of Liberia (Dr Stephen Kennedy)

Strengthening Clinical and Genomics Research Capacity on Arboviruses

The West African region continues to experience major outbreaks of epidemic pathogens, including arbovirus (dengue, Zika, and Chikungunya), highlighting the need to understand the natural history of these diseases and strengthen the capacity for a coordinated response to their growing threat in the sub-region.

The overall goal of this project is to advance sub-regional epidemic preparedness and response through multi-disciplinary, integrated collaborative research and training initiatives to facilitate evidence-based policy for surveillance and control of epidemic pathogens in WAC-CREP countries of Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone with a focus on dengue, Zika, and chikungunya.

Specifically, this project seeks to:

  • assessing the extent of the geographic and temporal distribution of asymptomatic and symptomatic arboviral pathogens to elucidate inter-epidemic maintenance of these pathogens in human and mosquito vectors
  • examining the link between human host factors and virus genetic variants, in relation with clinical manifestation and disease severity
  • strengthening subregional clinical research platform for drug and vaccine trials against arboviruses

Using innovative metagenomic approaches, the project contributes to multiple pathogen discovery, providing high-level laboratory and clinical research capacity to support countries’ epidemic preparedness for response to epidemics.

About the Consortium Lead

Professor Seydou Doumbia is Director of the University Clinical Research Center and Honorary Dean of the Medical School and Dentistry at USTT. For more than 25 years, he has been engaged in translational research and capacity building for research on infectious diseases, including malaria, HIV/TB, emerging infectious diseases, and neglected tropical diseases. He has been awarded several research grants to address the epidemiology, genomics, pathogenesis, and the development and evaluation of new interventions to control and prevent these diseases.

His research training grants contributed to establishing graduate training in public health, implementation sciences, bioinformatics, and data sciences at USTTB. Professor Doumbia is Chair of the West African Consortium for Clinical Research on Emerging Pathogens (WAC-CREP), a network including Mali, Guinea Conakry, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, aiming to harmonize clinical research for multi-centre studies and subregional preparedness for response to epidemics pathogens.