16.04.2021

DAAD funds eight new Global Centers for Climate and Health

Global challenges can only be mastered through cooperation. This belief is the basis of the DAAD’s programme to promote the establishment of eight Global Centres dedicated to climate & the environment, as well as health & pandemic prevention, using funding from the Federal Foreign Office. One of the four funded Global Health and Pandemic Preparedness Centers is the German-West African Centre for Global Health and Pandemic Prevention (G-WAC) Ghana (+westafrican region).

About G-WAC:

Topic: Global pandemics and their key drivers, as well as essential elements of resilient health systems under the One Health approach 
Institution: Berlin School of Public Health (Technical University Berlin and Charité Berlin) and University of Bonn (Institute of Medical Microbiology Immunology and Parasitology and the Institute for Hygiene and Public Health)
Partner: Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology and others

Short description: The aim of G-WAC is to establish a German-West African Centre for Global Health and Pandemic Prevention based at the KNUST-College of Health Sciences in Kumasi, Ghana, that will address the existential threat of global pandemics to the health and welfare of people. Through trans- and inter-disciplinary research projects targeting both the main drivers of pandemics (e.g. health impact of wild habitat encroachment, extensive agriculture and climate change, spill over of pathogens from wild animals to humans) and the key pillars of resilient health systems in the WHO framework (e.g. effective governance, sustainable financing mechanisms, appropriate human resource capacity, availability of essential medicines and technology, reliable health information, and
responsive health service delivery) are being examined using One Health approaches. 

DAAD press release

Uni Bonn press release

L-R, Prof. Achim Hoerauf (Bonn), Prof. Alex Debrah (KNUST, Ghana), Dr. Linda Batsa Debrah (KNUST, Ghana) and Angelika Kellings (Bonn)
Photo © A. Kellings