Fast deployed mobile laboratories to enhance situational awareness for pandemics and emerging infectious diseases

Expected Outcome:

Projects’ results are expected to contribute to the following outcomes:

• Inventory and comparison of existing mobile laboratories, including heavy structures (both military and civilian) and light self-sustained systems, evaluation of quality management systems for maintenance, validation and testing.
• New (mobile laboratory) solutions for the fast, reliable and unambiguous detection and identification of infectious agents, diagnostic tests, monitoring and mapping of contamination and enhanced field data communication to decision-making authorities.
• Strategies to orchestrate mobile laboratory capacities in the EU, and improvements in the management of trained staff in Europe.

Scope:

The recent COVID-19 crisis has demonstrated that the ability to rapidly identify viruses on scene under a proper quality control/assurance regime is crucial to ensure adequate risk assessment, optimal risk management, and proper counter measures. Consequently, a determining factor is to bring a rapidly deployable diagnostic capacity as close as possible to the crisis area. Considering specific infectious diseases is of paramount importance as also is the possibility to develop scalable capacities for joint multinational intervention. In the EU Civil Protection and Health policy framework, mobile laboratories are increasingly becoming part of crisis responses and recovery plans, and the COVID-19 illustrated the needs for further developments in this area. Pandemics risk mitigation comprises prevention, preparedness and post-crisis management, including networking, regional and international partnership, consolidating, coordinating and optimizing existing capabilities in terms of expertise, training, technical assistance and equipment. There is a need for building synergies among existing initiatives to develop an EU capacity building by strengthening the national and regional capacities and staff training for mobile laboratories operation, long-term sustainability culture of safety and security.

In order to achieve the expected outcomes, international cooperation is encouraged, in particular with Japan in the framework of the EU-Japan collaboration on pandemics.

Where possible and relevant, synergy-building and clustering initiatives with successful proposals in the same area should be considered, including the organisation of international conferences in close coordination with the Community for European Research and Innovation for Security (CERIS) activities and/or other international events.

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