Förbättrad förståelse av odiagnosticerade infektionssjukdomar hos barn i Uganda

Several resource-limited tropical and sub-tropical African countries are faced with low capability to investigate outbreaks where the aetiological agent has not been identified.

In Uganda, a wide variety of febrile diseases and acute central nervous system infections are causing important issues for public health, particularly for children, where more than half of these syndromes remain undiagnosed.

This is mainly due to (i) the breadth and diversity of aetiological agents originating from the environment, human population or animals; and (ii) the lack of knowledge and health infrastructure that can serve the community.

This is a significant cause for concern, as many patients require critical care and long-term neurological sequelae are common among survivors.

Therefore, partners from Sweden and Uganda will initiate a research network, where we (I) join forces and combine our current research efforts to create a One Health oriented team to study human health in the context of undiagnosed infectious diseases.

This will also include (II) a NGS pilot study aimed at identification of known and potentially novel pathogens in Ugandan children with undiagnosed syndromes, but also including diagnostic development, and reciprocal technology and research knowledge-transfer.

Importantly, this network will be the starting point for a long-term collaboration leading up to (III) submission of joint research grant applications at the national and international level.