{"id":6548,"date":"2020-04-01T08:59:26","date_gmt":"2020-04-01T06:59:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/fr\/covid-19-lexpertise-sud-et-le-partenariat-de-lird-contre-la-pandemie\/"},"modified":"2020-04-01T08:59:26","modified_gmt":"2020-04-01T06:59:26","slug":"covid-19-southern-expertise-and-the-lird-pandemic-partnership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/covid-19-lexpertise-sud-et-le-partenariat-de-lird-contre-la-pandemie\/","title":{"rendered":"Covid-19: IRD's Southern expertise and partnership against the pandemic"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The experience of IRD researchers in the intertropics provides valuable lessons in terms of pandemic analysis, epidemiology, treatment and the orientation of public health policies.<\/p>

IRD researchers and their scientific partners in developing countries are strongly mobilised against the pandemic, through concerted French and international research actions in the field and in support of public decision-making.<\/p>

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Setting up diagnostic resources, shedding light on the social sciences, supporting epidemiological surveillance, linking up with upheavals in biodiversity, analysing the response of healthcare systems: the Institute's research and resources have been redirected to combat the pandemic wherever possible.<\/p>

The presence of IRD researchers on long-term assignments or on expatriation or of specific IRD teams (mixed units, young associated teams) at the partners' sites has facilitated rapid reactions.<\/p>

Working with African partners to halt the spread of the virus on the continent<\/p>

The UMR TransVIHMI (Montpellier) is leading the CORAF (Coronavirus Africa) project, designed to provide a rapid response to the social issues raised by the epidemic and to inform decision-makers, in particular by comparing the response in Senegal (a ministerial initiative), Burkina Faso (a community initiative) and Benin. The study is based in particular on monitoring and analysis of the media and online opinions. The same TransVIHMI unit, through the LMI Pr\u00e9vihmi (Cameroon and DRC) and RESPIRE (Guinea), has supported the implementation of diagnostic tools in these three countries.
The expertise of the UVE unit has been used in Mali and Senegal to support detection (but also in Bolivia and Martinique).\u00a0\u00a0
At CIRMF (Gabon), the WHO reference laboratory for zoonoses in Central Africa, the Mivegec Unit (in particular through the presence of an IRD researcher on site) was called upon to bring diagnostic resources closer to the population.
The Mivegec unit is also working in Burkina-Faso and Madagascar (as well as in Mexico) to help model the epidemic, in order to support public decision-making.
The SESSTIM unit is in contact with the Ministry of Health in Burkina Faso, in order to support the analysis of the progression of the virus.
In Ghana, UMR Merit, based at the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, the national reference centre for Covid-19 screening, is providing logistical support to increase diagnostic capacity.\u00a0
IRD is a member of the Pan-African Network For Rapid Research, Response, Relief and Preparedness for Infectious Diseases Epidemics (PANDORA-ID-NET) consortium, which is currently working with the African CDC to provide surveillance and training assistance to teams on the ground.
IRD is a partner in WANETAM, the West frican Network for poverty related diseases (PRDs), which has received funding from the Gates Foundation to halt the spread of the virus in Africa.<\/p>

But also with our Asian partners\u00a0<\/p>

The Vitrome, MEPHI and UVE units have been in the front line in the care of the first returnees from China through the IHU M\u00e9diterran\u00e9e infection and continue to be heavily involved in screening and ongoing trials.
Thanks to the presence in Laos in February 2020 of an IRD researcher (UVE), support has been provided for training teams at Vientiane's Mahosot Hospital in infection diagnosis technology. The Institute is involved in two other research projects on monitoring the emergence and spread of the virus, its surveillance in rural areas and a possible ANR project on animals in markets.
The IRD's PHPT international research unit in Thailand responded to a call from the Welcome Trust to propose a clinical and virological study of febrile pregnant women.
With the IRD's Thai partners (AMS: Faculty of Medical Sciences), a molecular biology laboratory has been set up to offer \"drive through\" screening tests (outside the city and at a distance from hospitals, allowing people to have as few interactions as possible, to reduce the fear of contamination).
In Vietnam, a multidisciplinary team of researchers from Ummisco, Mivegec and Diade is using available data to build realistic spatial computer models to inform public health decisions (comparisons and combinations of strategies, influence on transmission dynamics, possible optimisations in terms of implementation timescales, etc.). The models can be freely consulted and downloaded from the JEAI Warm GitHub server, and details of the methodology can be found on the GAMA website.\u00a0<\/p>

Contributing to the collective scientific effort against the virus<\/p>

Two IRD scientific initiatives, led respectively by Laetitia Atlani-Duault and Marc Egrot and focusing on the contribution of social sciences, have been selected as part of the mobilisation coordinated by Aviesan to accelerate research on the COVID-19 virus and disease, via the REACTing consortium coordinated by Inserm. The project led by Laetitia Atlani-Duault aims to analyse big data from social networks (for the French-speaking part, this includes West Africa).
Several research projects involving IRD teams have been selected for funding by the European Commission, with the aim of advancing our understanding of the coronavirus, contributing to more effective clinical management and the preparedness and response of public health systems to the epidemic: diagnosis with The European Virus Archive - GLOBAL (EVA-GLOBAL or EVAg) and also PANDORA-ID-NET.
The COCONEL (Coronavirus and Containment: Longitudinal Survey) research project being carried out by the UMR Vitrome aims to analyse the perceptions, knowledge and behaviour of the French population in the face of the unprecedented experience of containment and, more generally, in the face of the pandemic. This project has received financial support from the IRD for the first wave of the survey.
The UMR ISEM (Jean-Christophe Avarre) and the IDVet company have launched a trial on a rapid diagnostic solution.\u00a0<\/p>

Analysing and anticipating the evolution of the pandemic\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

The PIMIT unit has been working on the phylogeny of the virus?\u00a0
Three researchers from UMR Ceped and RESILIENCES have obtained funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research for a project co-sponsored with Mac Gill University on the response to COVID-19 in four different healthcare systems (Canada, France, Brazil, Mali).\u00a0
IRD researchers are working on modelling the epidemic, notably within the Mivegec unit (a project has been selected as part of the ANR Flash Covid-19).
Researchers at AMSE, a unit associated with the IRD, are proposing an approach to global pandemics that involves measuring and monitoring the acceleration\/deceleration of confirmed cases and deaths in relation to health policy responses.\u00a0<\/p>

Looking for ways to vaccinate and treat<\/p>

The IHU M\u00e9diterran\u00e9e infection team (under IRD supervision) is working on the efficacy of using hydroxychloroquine to treat Covid-19. Initial results are promising, showing a clear reduction in the viral load of some of the patients treated.
The DiaTropix programme, funded by the IRD as a founding member, is currently working on the development of a rapid diagnostic test in Senegal.
The TransVIHMI unit in the DRC is working to evaluate treatment with an anti-retroviral used to combat HIV.<\/p>

Support political decision-making and promote the dissemination of knowledge to the public<\/p>

La\u00ebtitia Atlani-Duault, an anthropologist and director of research at the IRD, is a member of the scientific council set up at the request of the President of the Republic to advise the Minister for Solidarity and Health on the management of the health situation linked to the coronavirus. She has also been appointed to the CARE - Comit\u00e9 analyse recherche et expertise by the Presidency.\u00a0
Researcher Alice Desclaux (TransVIHMI) contributes to the WHO Blueprint working group on global research priorities.\u00a0
From January onwards, IRD researchers, in their respective fields of expertise, have responded widely (more than 150 articles) to requests from the general and specialist media, providing insights and perspectives in interviews, for example on the zoonosis that is thought to be at the origin of the pandemic; and globally on the eco-epidemiological aspects (links with changes in the environment, loss of biodiversity). IRD researchers will also be giving their views in The Conversation and the IRD Mag'.<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p><\/div><\/div><\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

L\u2019exp\u00e9rience des chercheurs de l\u2019IRD sur les terrains intertropicaux\u00a0fournit des enseignements pr\u00e9cieux en termes d\u2019analyse de la pand\u00e9mie, d’\u00e9pid\u00e9miologie, de traitement et d’orientation des politiques publiques\u00a0de sant\u00e9.Les chercheurs de l\u2019IRD […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4489,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6548","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-actualites"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6548\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mio.osupytheas.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}