Building Military Influenza Surveillance Capacity in West Africa

Abstract

Militaries are especially susceptible to operationally important outbreaks of acute respiratory infections such as pandemic and seasonal influenza. In addition, militaries play important roles for State Parties working to meet International Health Regulations 2005, particularly in developing countries. In 2009, the U.S. Naval Medical Research Unit No. 3 joined with the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research and the armed forces of Ghana, Burkina Faso, and Côte d'Ivoire to create or improve influenza surveillance capacities within the militaries. This article describes the process undertaken to achieve this goal. In the Ghana Armed Forces, influenza surveillance for outpatients was instituted at seven medical stations throughout the country and for inpatients at the tertiary referral hospital in Accra. As a result, military sites now contribute around half of the influenza cases detected in Ghana and reported weekly to the World Health Organization. Samples were also collected by the militaries of Côte d'Ivoire and Burkina Faso, although political instability slowed progress. This effort is part of an ongoing strategy to build influenza surveillance capacity within West African militaries in support of military services, global outbreak investigations, International Health Regulations-2005, and the development of country-specific pandemic preparedness plans.

Risk factors for febrile respiratory illness and mono-viral infections in a semi-closed military environment: a case-control study

“…Febrile respiratory illness (FRI) results in substantial disease burden in semi-closed environments such as in the households [1] and militaries [2][3][4]. FRI is most commonly caused by viral infections, as observed in military respiratory surveillance programmes in Finland [5], United Kingdom [4,[6][7][8][9], Netherlands [10], France [11,12], South Korea [13][14][15], West Africa [16], Taiwan [17], China [18], Singapore [19][20][21][22][23][24], and the United States [3,[25][26][27][28][29].…”

Translating Predictions of Zoonotic Viruses for Policymakers

“…We found that experts from federal ministries, reference laboratories, and uniformed services had insights on emerging pathogens. Partnerships across national agencies in Africa, such as militaries, have aided in developing surveillance programs for emerging zoonotic diseases (Witt et al 2011;Kronmann et al 2013). Modelers could approach these experts to refine their models.…”

Epidemiology of influenza in Ghana, 2011 to 2019

“…The National Influenza Center (NIC) at NMIMR monitors the circulation of influenza viruses in Ghana and provides information to the WHO Global Influenza Surveillance and Response System (GISRS). As part of the Integrated Disease Surveillance and Response (IDSR) system of the GHS and in collaboration with NAMRU-3, 29 sentinel sites were established for influenza virus surveillance in Ghana [15]. The sites, located across the ten regions of Ghana, included eighteen GHS facilities (regional hospitals, municipal hospitals, district hospitals, polyclinics, and health centers) and eleven military medical reception stations (MRS).…”