Infections '21. Transmission Control of Infections in the 21st Century

During the first funding period, GIGA researchers conducted the project "Control of Infections: Perception of Risks and Political Agenda for Providing a Public Good", contributing to the alliance's Interdisciplinary Research Group on Human2Human-Transmission. They investigated whether political commitment and innovative efforts in this field respond to cycles of public attention related to the outbreak and assumed risk of epidemics. Their work was linked to various activities of international cooperation (among others with two colleagues from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine) and introduced a perspective of policy field analysis in international discourses so far dominated by biomedical and public health discourses. The approach links up with a growing volume of research on global public goods for health (see: work by Richard D. Smith and Ilona Kickbusch), applying the concept to the field of infection control. In 2019, projects around a new focus on antibiotic/antimicrobial resistance (AMR) have been started; GIGA cooperates with the Bernhard-Nocht-Institute for Tropical Medicine (BNITM) in an analysis of the implementation of National Action Plans on AMR in African countries.

The second strand of research is access to medicines and vaccines. This research was expanded with regard to COVID-19 in summer 2020. Together with the BNITM, the GIGA will investigate whether the international commitment to a fair distribution of a future COVID-19 vaccine is going to be met and if low and middle income countries will have the same access to new effective therapies against Sars-CoV-2 as other countries. The research will follow a two-pronged approach: The GIGA will monitor at the global level whether commitments to equitable access to COVID-19 health products are being met and how different actors influence the global debate and developments on future access to medicines. The BNITM will analyze at the national level whether and how Ghana, as a low to middle income country, is taking measures to gain access to possible future vaccines and medicines.