The Robert Koch Institute (RKI): main building in Berlin. more
Germany’s Public Health institute RKI monitors the population’s health and wellbeing. more
The Robert Koch Institute is the German government's central institution for the identification, surveillance and prevention of infectious diseases in the Portfolio of the German Ministry of Health. more
Western Balkan Strategic Partnership
Duration: 2023 - 2025
Partner countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia
Partner institutions:
Involved RKI unit: ZIG 4, DIV 24, DIV 31, DIV 37
The Western Balkans are faced with limited access to universal health coverage and a lower life expectancy compared to the EU countries. The COVID-19 pandemic placed a severe burden on the healthcare systems and exposed supply bottlenecks, limited treatment options, and the need to develop future coping strategies. Laboratory-based diagnostics and surveillance gaps, especially in antimicrobial resistance (AMR), persist and remain challenging. Aside from the need to strengthen these capacities to foster efficient decision-making and allocation of resources, the necessity for regional collaboration on preparedness and response to infectious disease outbreaks has become evident.
The overall aim of the project is to strengthen public health core capacities in the Western Balkan region. This is addressed by working with national public health institutes from the region across four thematic areas:
In order to limit the spread of infectious diseases, it is important to empower rapid epidemiological event investigation and response. The project strives to prevent but also prepare for infectious disease outbreaks by enabling a coordinated and scalable crisis management.
Clinical telemedicine support and capacity building aim at improving patient safety. This also applies to the reinforced surveillance of antimicrobial resistance, antibiotic use, and hospital-acquired infections in Montenegro and beyond.
The project aims at improving rapid diagnostics by strengthening and extending capacities for molecular diagnostic and sequencing, including bioinformatic data analysis and intensified regional networks. Moreover, the project partners intend to implement a biorisk management programme and to apply best practices for biosafety in outbreak situations.
A set of population health metric indicators is planned to be defined in order to establish a monitoring system for epidemic and/or pandemic surveillance. The project members not only want to use and improve existing data infrastructures but also foster the development of specific competencies required to calculate and interpret different population health metrics.
The implementation of project goals is addressed primarily through trainings, workshops, seminars, data labs, and consulting activities. Laboratory and hospitals visits are conducted based on the needs and requirements identified.
The first thematic area on epidemiological crisis management uses workshops and simulation exercises to improve the prevention, detection, management and response to infectious disease health emergencies. With regard to infectious disease preparedness and response, specified as core capacities in the International Health Regulations (2005), the project seeks the development of guidance, training and evaluation.
The second thematic area on clinical management and AMR includes in-person and telemedical training in Berlin and Montenegro to improve intensive care medicine. The project team plans on developing an IT solution to strengthen surveillance and management of resistant pathogens, antibiotic use, and hospital acquired infections.
The third thematic area on molecular diagnostics and sequencing capacities applies on-site trainings to integrate additional tests into existing workflows for molecular diagnostics. In addition to biosafety trainings, workshops and trainings foster genomic sequencing capacities and bioinformatic data analysis beyond SARS-CoV-2.
The fourth thematic area uses population health metrics for the improved surveillance of dynamic outbreaks within and across countries. A participatory selection of indicators appropriate for epidemic/pandemic monitoring is followed by data mapping to determine availability and accessibility of fine-grained data over time. Participating countries will conduct a decentralized data collection for the pre-, during- and (post)- COVID-19 phase as a working example. Finally, the project aims to develop data visualization concepts and a knowledge transfer approach of population health metrics.
Date: 23.08.2023
