September 11, 2023
How pandemic preparedness let Tanzania successfully control a Marburg outbreak
Is pandemic preparedness work paying off for East African countries? The successful containment of a recent Marburg outbreak in Tanzania suggests the answer is yes.
May 11, 2023
Young Africans are stepping up in support of their continent’s New Public Health Order
The Africa Centers of Disease Control and Prevention want to involve young Africans in public health governance. How did this come about and how will it work?
May 8, 2023
The Bingwa Initiative – how young people have boosted Africa’s COVID-19 vaccination campaigns
Across the African continent young volunteers have volunteered to accelerate the uptake of COVID-19 vaccinations. This Africa CDC initiative is a deliberate effort to ensure that Africa’s greatest asset - young people - are fully involved in, and own, their countries’ COVID-19 responses and recovery strategies.
January 31, 2023
A new bio-security lab is boosting Ecuador’s pandemic preparedness
Why Ecuador’s government and health workers are determined to make their health system more resilient - and how German technical cooperation supports this endeavour.
December 9, 2022
Strengthening health value chains by partnering with the private sector in the SADC region
How and why German development cooperation invests, technically and financially, in local manufacturing of medical and pharmaceutical products.
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Pandemic preparedness
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Without pandemic preparedness infectious disease outbreaks can swiftly turn into global threats.
No single country is in a position – on its own – to protect itself against international public health threats. With over two billion passengers travelling by air annually, disease outbreaks which go unnoticed or are not stopped at their point of origin can spread to multiple locations. The emergence of SARS in 2003, the subsequent outbreaks of ‘avian flu’, ‘swine flu’ and Ebola are all reminders of our shared vulnerability to disease and newly arising health threats. Twelve years before COVID-19, most scientists prophetically agreed that the emergence of another, potentially severe pandemic of influenza was only a matter of time.
‘Pandemic preparedness’ refers to a country’s state of readiness to prevent, detect, report and respond to disease outbreaks. Being prepared requires country-level preparedness based on a resilient national health system, on the one hand, and transparent and trust-based communication and collaboration at an international level to deal with emergent outbreaks, on the other.
Supporting pandemic preparedness of partner countries to strengthen the resilience of their health systems and to protect their populations is a priority of German development cooperation, as reflected in the articles, events and studies presented on this page.
Stories
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How pandemic preparedness let Tanzania successfully control a Marburg outbreak
Is pandemic preparedness work paying off for East African countries? The successful containment of a recent Marburg outbreak in Tanzania suggests the answer is yes.
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Young Africans are stepping up in support of their continent’s New Public Health Order
The Africa Centers of Disease Control and Prevention want to involve young Africans in public health governance. How did this come about and how will it work?
-
The Bingwa Initiative – how young people have boosted Africa’s COVID-19 vaccination campaigns
Across the African continent young volunteers have volunteered to accelerate the uptake of COVID-19 vaccinations. This Africa CDC initiative is a deliberate effort to ensure that Africa’s greatest asset – young people – are fully involved in, and own, their countries’ COVID-19 responses and recovery strategies.
All stories about pandemic preparedness
Events
Studies
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A software for disease surveillance and outbreak response
Insights from implementing SORMAS in Nigeria and Ghana