BANGKOK | November 26, 2024 ― The World Health Organization (WHO) and partners today announced ten projects that will receive almost US$ 2 million in grants to improve capacities in pathogen genomic surveillance.
The catalytic grant fund was established by the International Pathogen Surveillance Network (IPSN) to support partners from low- and middle-income countries to build their capacities in pathogen genomic analysis. This technology analyses the genetic code of viruses, bacteria and other disease-causing organisms to understand, in conjunction with other data, how easily they spread, and how sick they can make people. This data allows scientists and public health teams to track and respond to infectious disease threats, supports the development of vaccines and treatments and empowers countries to take faster decisions.
The fund is hosted by the UN Foundation and the initial grants have been provided by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation and Wellcome Trust.
“The IPSN catalytic grant fund has incredible potential to expand pathogen genomic surveillance for all, which we are already seeing through the first round of grantmaking,” said Sara Hersey, Director of Collaborative Intelligence at the WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence. “We are eager to support this work, which plays a key role in pandemic and epidemic prevention worldwide.”
“The IPSN catalytic grant fund recipients will accelerate the benefits of pathogen genomic surveillance in low- and middle-income settings, as well as explore new applications for genomic surveillance, such as wastewater surveillance,” said Manisha Bhinge, Vice President of the Health Initiative at The Rockefeller Foundation. “ Pandemics and epidemics continue to be a global threat, further amplified by climate change. There is urgent need for equitable access to these tools and capabilities to protect lives in vulnerable communities.”
One of the recipients, the American University of Beirut, will use wastewater surveillance to monitor disease spread among refugee populations, demonstrating how pathogen genomic surveillance can be implemented in migration settings. Another grantee, the Pasteur Institute of Laos, will use the funding to develop new methods to track avian flu in live-bird markets, a setting that is often overlooked but vital to millions of people worldwide.
“Grantees of the IPSN catalytic grant fund will generate new insights, knowledge and evidence that will benefit the whole pathogen genomic surveillance community worldwide,” said Josie Golding, Head of Epidemics and Epidemiology at the Wellcome Trust.
The Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil will use the funding to develop an open-source bioinformatics tool that can be used to conduct offline analyses. The tool will be piloted in Latin America with potential for global use, especially in low-resource settings.
“Within the past year, the IPSN has made many strides. Notably, the IPSN’s mobilization of experts to work on the mpox epidemic has made a strong case for the network’s ability to coordinate around public health emergencies. There is a strong potential for IPSN to play a role in the rapid response to future emergencies and highlight the importance of pathogen genomics surveillance,” said Simon Harris of the Gates Foundation.
The grantees were announced at the IPSN Global Partners Forum held in Bangkok, Thailand, from 21 – 22 November. The event was co-hosted by the WHO South-East Asian and Western Pacific Regional Offices and the Centre for Pathogen Genomics at the Doherty Institute.
A second round of catalytic grant funds will be made available to IPSN members in 2025.
Note to Editors
Background on the IPSN
The IPSN is a new global network of pathogen genomic actors, brought together by the WHO Pandemic Hub, to accelerate progress on the deployment of pathogen genomics, and improve public health decision-making. The IPSN envisions a world where every country has equitable access to sustained capacity for genomic sequencing and analytics as part of its public health surveillance system. It sets out to create a mutually supportive global network of genomic surveillance actors that amplifies and accelerates the work of its members to improve access and equity.
More information about the network can be found here: www.who.int/initiatives/international-pathogen-surveillance-network.
Background on the WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence
Forming part of the WHO Health Emergencies Programme, the WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence (the WHO Pandemic Hub), facilitates a global collaboration of partners from multiple sectors that supports countries and stakeholders to address future pandemic and epidemic risks with better access to data, better analytical capacities, and better tools and insights for decision-making. With support from the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany, the WHO Pandemic Hub was established in September 2021 in Berlin, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which demonstrated weaknesses around the world in how countries detect, monitor and manage public health threats.
More information about the WHO Pandemic Hub can be found here: https://pandemichub.who.int
Background on the Centre for Pathogen Genomics
The Centre for Pathogen Genomics at the Doherty Institute, University of Melbourne is an academic and training hub that supports new collaboration for translational research, genomics-informed infectious disease surveillance, and capacity building and training across the Asia-Pacific region. The Centre is underpinned by a portfolio of world-leading experts across pathogen genomics, public health, surveillance, bioinformatics, research, and capacity building and training, with years of experience in using cutting-edge technologies to address infectious diseases of national and global importance.
Full list of the first IPSN catalytic grantees:
- National Institute for Health Research (Angola) – “Metagenomic surveillance for epidemic prevention in the DRC-Angola cross-border (FEEVIR Project)”
- Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) – “Development of an offline-capable computational framework for decentralized real-time untargeted pathogen genomic surveillance”
- National Public Health Laboratory (Cameroon) – “Integrating surveillance of malaria parasites into the National Public Health Laboratory genomics platform in Cameroon”
- Evangelical University of Africa (Democratic Republic of Congo) – “Generating genomic surveillance data of pathogens in Democratic Republic of Congo by extending the Mini-Lab with a Nanopore MinION sequencer”
- Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, University of Ghana (Ghana) – “Air Sampling Surveillance for Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring and Pathogens of Public Health Interest”
- Ashoka University, International Foundation for Research and Education, Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (India) – “Quantitative mapping of environmental to clinical AMR via DNA barcoding”
- Pasteur Institute of Laos (Laos) – “Environmental genomic surveillance of avian Influenza A viruses in high-risk live-bird markets in Laos: an innovative sequencing approach”
- American University of Beirut (Lebanon) – “Wastewater Genomic Surveillance of Underestimated Viral Diarrheal Diseases among Vulnerable and Refugee Populations in Lebanon”
- Rwanda Biomedical Centre (Rwanda) – “Establishing a Rwandan One Health genomic surveillance network for endemic and emerging viral hemorrhagic fevers”
- Medical Research Institute Colombo (Sri Lanka) – “Piloting the application of pathogen genomics for public health and surveillance of foodborne disease”
About The Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation is a pioneering philanthropy built on collaborative partnerships at the frontiers of science, technology, and innovation that enable individuals, families, and communities to flourish. We make big bets to promote the well-being of humanity. Today, we are focused on advancing human opportunity and reversing the climate crisis by transforming systems in food, health, energy, and finance. For more information, sign up for our newsletter at www.rockefellerfoundation.org/subscribe and follow us on X @RockefellerFdn and LI @the-rockefeller-foundation.
This press release first appeared in www.who.int on November 26th, 2024, and is reposted with permission.
Media Contacts
Devika Gadhavi
The Rockefeller Foundation
