Projects
USAID Health Security Activity Ethiopia (2025-2029)
The USAID/Ethiopia Health Security Activity (HSA) aims to reduce the impact of infectious disease outbreaks on morbidity and mortality in Ethiopia by strengthening One Health surveillance, diagnostics, and workforce development. This activity, funded by USAID, focuses on building a resilient system for preventing, detecting, and responding to emerging infectious diseases with pandemic potential.
Key aspects of the USAID Health Security Activity in Ethiopia:
- Focus on One Health: The activity emphasizes a One Health approach, recognizing the interconnectedness of human, animal, and environmental health.
- Strengthening Surveillance: We aim to enhance Ethiopia’s capacity to detect and track infectious diseases, including those with pandemic potential.
- Improving Diagnostics: The activity supports the development of diagnostic tools and technologies to accurately identify and monitor infectious diseases.
- Building Workforce Capacity: HSA focuses on training and developing healthcare professionals, particularly in the areas of public health and infectious disease control.
- Multisectoral Collaboration: The activity works collaboratively with the Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Health (including EPHI), and Ethiopian Wildlife Conservation Authority, among other agencies.
- GHSA Action Packages: The activity utilizes 10 GHSA action packages to improve multisectoral collaboration and strengthen public health and animal health systems.
USAID STOP Spillover projects supported by The Gass Lab (2020-2025)
Strategies to Prevent (STOP) Spillover, a USAID-funded project led by Tufts University, is a global consortium of experts in human, animal, and environmental health who will take the next step in understanding and addressing the risks posed by known zoonotic viruses that have the potential to spill over and cause pandemic crises. The STOP Spillover project provides a critical opportunity to enhance global understanding of the complex drivers of viral spillover and augment sustainable national capacities in risk analysis and mitigation, spillover intervention, and behavior change.
Some STOP Spillover project examples:
-Live-bird market interventions to reduce risks of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) viruses in Bangladesh
-Wastewater and Liquid Waste Effluent Surveillance in Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia
-Bat guano harvesting and coronavirus risks in Cambodia
-Wildlife farm surveillance and biosafety interventions in Viet Nam
NIH/NIAID grants supported by The Gass Lab and Runstadler Lab
-Predictive ecological and changing environmental drivers of highly pathogenic avian influenza virus spread between Europe and North America, 2023
-Global dissemination of avian influenza viruses is driven by wild bird migration through arctic and subarctic zones, 2022