20/04/2025
The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announce a partnership in health security to strengthen disease surveillance in Africa.Today, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announced the establishment of a Health Security Partnership to enhance disease surveillance and operational epidemiological intelligence gathering in Africa. The partnership aims to strengthen Africa’s health security capabilities, particularly in areas such as biosafety, integrated disease surveillance, event-based surveillance, genomic surveillance, and real-time epidemic intelligence. The initiative will actively encourage country participation, with the first phase being implemented in six African Union member states—The Gambia, Mali, Morocco, Namibia, Tunisia, and South Africa—before expanding to other countries.
Enhancing disease surveillance is a fundamental component of ensuring health security. Over the past decade, significant progress has been made in disease surveillance in Africa. However, disease outbreaks and other public health emergencies occur more frequently on this continent than elsewhere, and many of these outbreaks or emergencies can be prevented or controlled through proven public health measures. The COVID-19 pandemic underscored the crucial role that health system laboratories play in surveillance and highlighted the need for improved methods of data collection, processing, presentation, and dissemination to ensure evidence-based policymaking during health emergencies.
In this regard, the Health Security Partnership in Africa will work to improve the capacity for integrated disease surveillance across the continent to better detect, confirm, and report health security threats. “The project’s multi-country consultations and the launch meeting are important milestones in strengthening surveillance capacity and operational epidemiological intelligence in Africa. This will serve as a platform for sharing experiences and best practices, which will be crucial to the project's success,” said Dr. Yenew Kebede, Head of the Laboratory Systems and Networks Division at Africa CDC.
WHO’s regional offices for Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean, driven by a shared commitment to supporting African countries in strengthening health systems and protecting public health, are closely collaborating with Africa CDC through the Joint Emergency Action Plan (JEAP). This initiative aims to enhance surveillance, foster regional cooperation, and address health challenges across Africa. The Health Security Partnership in Africa will contribute to broader collaborative efforts on the continent and will pursue tangible outcomes in emergency preparedness and response, surveillance, and laboratory capacity strengthening. It will also help safeguard public health by improving coordination and increasing the resilience of health systems.
“Our collective ability to prevent, prepare for, and respond to health emergencies remains a critical factor in ensuring the safety of our populations,” said Sarah Hirschey, Director of the WHO Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence Operations and Analysis Unit. “Through this partnership, WHO will continue working with member states to systematically strengthen our shared capabilities and foster collaboration among stakeholders, sectors, and countries for more effective and coordinated disease surveillance in Africa.”
The Health Security Partnership in Africa, funded with support from the Government of Canada's Weapons Threat Reduction Program and aligned with the objectives of the G7-led Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction, reflects a collective commitment to health security cooperation. It will serve as a catalyst for accelerating the development and integration of surveillance capabilities and operational epidemiological intelligence across Africa, for the benefit of the continent and its people.
