Adedapo Adesanya
By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria is working on a strategy to integrate other infectious diseases into the genomic surveillance in the country.
This follows the advantage that genomic sequencing technology enhanced the fight against COVID-19 globally.
The strategy is intended to improve preparedness and reinforce health security in Nigeria. These efforts align with the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Global genomic surveillance strategy for pathogens with pandemic and epidemic potential 2022–2032 that provides the procedure to strengthen and scale up genomic surveillance worldwide.
Contributing to the plan, the Ministry of Health, with support from WHO, recently conducted a situation analysis of COVID-19 genomic surveillance in the country.
The venture was carried out by a team of technical experts from WHO’s Africa Regional and Nigeria Country Offices as well as the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and other partners as part of efforts to reinforce genomic surveillance in the African region.
In his first meeting with the delegates for the mission, the WHO Country Representative in Nigeria, Dr Walter Kazadi Mulombo, reiterated the importance of expanding sequencing capacity in Africa, saying beefing-up genomic surveillance to improve biosecurity in Nigeria and the entire continent is one of WHO priorities.
“Genomic surveillance is critical for early identification of emerging pathogens as well as preparation for any future outbreaks. Nigeria is a large country, and if it can get it right with genomic sequencing, we will become well prepared in informing diagnostics, vaccine production, and biosecurity consciousness.
“With the reoccurrence of Lassa fever, monkeypox, and other infectious diseases, we need to strengthen our sequencing capacity beyond COVID-19 to other diseases, hence the need to consider other potential laboratories and strategies to expand its sequencing capacity,” he said.
Since 2021, the WHO Country Office in Nigeria has been working closely with the Ministry of Health to enhance genomic surveillance with financial support from the African Development Bank (AfDB) and Health Pool Fund donors, including the European Union and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO).
Meanwhile, the Chief Molecular Bioengineer NCDC NRL, Dr Emeka Ndodo, said that NCDC has been at the forefront of supporting all the sub-national entities in health response, and the facilities visited have the tendencies to improve pandemic preparedness in the country.
During the early stages of the pandemic, only seven countries had sequencing capacity, and other countries had to rely on the sample referral system. But with the generous support of WHO, Africa CDC, and other stakeholders, Nigeria and 31 other countries now have the sequencing capacity to support their national public health laboratories.
Nigeria has contributed immensely to the COVID-19 genomic sequencing database with about 7,000 sequences on the Global Initiative on Sharing Avian Influenza Data (GISAID).
