Uganda joins WHO group on global health security

Nov 15, 2016

In 2014, Uganda headed African Union Support to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa

Uganda has been appointed a member on the World Health Organization (WHO) Advisory Group to the Alliance for Joint External Evaluation of global health security because of its interventions to promote biosafety and biosecurity.

Uganda and Senegal are the only two countries from the African continent which were appointed to join the WHO Group last month. Only two countries from each continent were selected to constitute the advisory group.

Dr. Issa Makumbi, the head of the Public Health Emergency Operations Centre in the health ministry, told New Vision on the sidelines of the first East Africa regional biosafety and biosecurity conference at Kampala Sheraton Hotel yesterday, that Uganda was chosen partly on account of the enhanced competence of the health personnel and infrastructure.

"Our laboratory infrastructure and competence of health workers is improving, and that is why Uganda is playing a leading role in a number of health related interventions at the international level," Makumbi said, "We are going to launch a new state-of-art national reference laboratory in Luzira soon,"

In 2014, Uganda headed African Union Support to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. With funding from the US Government and World Bank, Uganda has set up a national reference laboratory in Luzira, a Kampala suburb. The laboratory, according to the health ministry, will complement and strengthen the country's laboratory capacity.

Until a few years ago, Uganda would send samples from cases of suspected infectious diseases to UK and South Africa for tests, but the enhanced laboratory capacity now in the country enables medical professionals to generate results in a matter of hours.

The US has also established a state-of-art laboratory at the National Animal Disease Diagnostics and Epidemiology Centre in Entebbe to help buttress the country's capacity to detect diseases in (animals).

The US based Centres for Disease Control (CDC) is funding a five year Public Health Fellowship Programme for Ugandan medical professionals at Makerere University School of Public Health to improve their competence to respond to public health threats.

"We will be advising and benefiting from the knowledge and experience of other countries in the field of global health security," Makumbi explained.

The health minister, Jane Ruth Aceng, said the selection of Uganda to be part of the WHO Group, is a milestone.

Global health security

Over 50 countries, including Uganda, endorsed the global health security partnerships in 2014 as a joint front in preventing and responding to public health threats.

The public health threats confronting the world today include dangers of deliberate use by terrorists of pathogens like Anthrax and any other virus to attack populations through various ways like introducing them into water sources and food. The conference was aimed at examining East Africa member states preparedness and response capacities and identification of gaps for action.

The threats have inspired a global effort for countries to tighten controls around their laboratory infrastructures and borders to nip bioterrorism in the bud by promoting biosafety and biosecurity.

Biosecurity is a set of preventive measures designed to reduce the risk of transmission of infectious diseases in humans, animals and crops harmful pests, invasive alien species, and living modified organisms. 

It is a strategic and integrated approach to analyzing and managing relevant risks to human, animal and plant life and health, and associated risks for the social disruption and national security. All over the world, laboratories keep viruses, including highly dangerous pathogens, for medical related purposes such as manufacture of vaccines, tests for drugs that could kill them and research. 

Access to laboratories is restricted because accidental or deliberate transfer of dangerous pathogens from (laboratories) to the environment outside restricted medical facilities can cause devastating health impact to the people.  However they are kept in laboratories under cold temperatures, which render them inactive, but they can be reactivated. 

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