Theme: Global Health Security: the Medical Laboratory Agenda for sub-Saharan Africa

Heath Security Agenda:

The Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) was launched in February  2014, to advance a world safe and secure from infectious disease threats, to bring together nations from all over the world to make new, concrete commitments, and to elevate global health security as a national leaders-level priority.

The vision of GHSA:

is a world  safe and secure from global health threats posed by infectious diseases – where we can prevent or mitigate the impact of naturally occurring outbreaks and accidentally or intentional release of dangerous pathogens, rapidly detect and transparently report outbreaks when they occur and employ an interconnected global network that can respond effectively and limit the spread of infectious diseases outbreak in humans and animals, mitigate human suffering and the loss of human life, and reduce economic impact.

Capital City 2019:

The Association of Medical Laboratory Scientists of Nigeria (AMLSN) is breaking away from the norm, by using its annual scientific conference this year, to focus on how the lofty goals of the GHSA could be advanced through an interconnected network of medical laboratories, in both public and clinical settings, that is capacitated to rapidly detect, and transparently report disease outbreaks in Nigeria and other sub-Saharan African countries.

The objectives of the conference include:

1. To  x-ray the goals, programs and activities implementation of the GHSA, and how these have helped  strengthened  the capacity of medical laboratories in public health and clinical settings, to rapidly detect, and transparently report disease outbreaks in Nigeria, or otherwise, in the last 5 years;
2. To galvanize attention of the government and people from key GHSA sectors, to the GHSA goals and how these can serve as veritable platforms and opportunities for a strengthened medical laboratory networks in sub-Saharan Africa.
3. To engage medical laboratory, public heath, global health experts to propose strategic steps and systems strengthening priorities for medical laboratories that are essential to achieve the goals and aspirations of the GHSA.
4. To create fora and opportunities for networking and collaboration between local and international experts on GHSA, medical laboratory scientists, public and global health practitioners, researchers, captains of industries, policy makers , laboratory product manufacturers and vendors, and health services and products consumers.

The overall goal of this conference is to promote GHSA as a veritable platform for laboratory systems strengthening, and facilitate the development of actionable strategic approaches for a coordinated sector wide medical laboratory systems strengthening efforts, from a systems perspective, that will support the development of a robust and interconnected network of laboratories that are adequately capacitated to rapidly detect, and transparently report disease outbreaks on the continent.

The target audience for this conference on GHSA include but not limited to: Medical laboratory professionals, public and global health experts, GHSA subject matter experts, researchers, epidemiologists, pathologists, clinicians, pharmacists, nurses, health care providers, the armed forces and other security experts, line ministries, departments and agencies of government, law makers, civil society groups, interested members of the general public.

The 3 days conference, which would be preceded by Pre-conference activities on 2nd September 2019, will be held at the Africa Hall of the Abuja International Conference Center (AICC) from the 3rd to the 5th of September 2019.

The conference will be declared open by His Excellency Mohammadu Buhari, the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The conference will feature 3 panel sessions, 3 satellite sessions, and 3 concurrent break-out sessions. There would also be presentations of abstracts of original research works, public health evaluation, and surveys by international and local subject matter experts, during the satellite sessions and poster presentations.

The Panel sessions will be focused on the conference sub-themes as follows:

1. Medical Laboratory Biosafety and BiosecurityManagement, in an era of heightened terrorism and disease outbreaks
2. Laboratory Based Disease Surveillance and Early Disease Detection
3. Public Private Partnership for Medical Laboratory Systems Strengthening for Global Health Security
4. Managing Inter-Professional Harmony and Collaboration in the health care sector for health security in Nigeria – an inter-professionals discussion panel.

The satellite sessions will be focused on the following:

1. The use of Multiplex Bead Assay (MBA) technology for laboratory based Integrated Disease Surveillance
2. Point of Care (POC) testing for the early detection of diseases – the facts and the fallacies
3. Antimicrobial Resistance Testing: Building A National Network
4. Capacity Building for Laboratory Based Disease Surveillance – Lessons Learned from the National AIDS Indicators and Impact Survey (NAIIS).

Abstracts of original research works, public health evaluation, and implementation science, by subject matter experts will be based on the following tracks and sub-tracks:

Track-1: Biosafety and Biosecurity Management

1.  local capacity building and systems strengthening for Biosafety and Biosecurity
2. Laboratory waste management systems
3. Standards, procedures, and Processes
4. policies and coordination

Track-2: Medical Laboratory Quality Management Systems and Leadership

1.  Local capacity building
2. Accreditation’s and certifications
3. Continuous quality improvement
4. Policies and standards

Track-3: Laboratory based Disease Surveillance systems

1. Strategies and approaches
2. Point of Care testing
3. New technologies and products
4. Policies, standards and coordination

Key note address at the conference will be presented by the African Center for Disease Control (ACDC), and the U.S Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Panel session speakers would be drawn from the following Institutions and Organizations: World Health Organization (WHO), CDC, and Nigerian Center for Disease Control (NCDC), Medical Laboratory Science Council of Nigeria (MLSCN), AFENET, University of Maryland (UMB), Institute of Human Virology (IHVN), other subject matter experts, and civil society representatives.

The conference will also future exhibitions from local and international laboratory equipment and instrument manufacturers and vendors. The exhibition will run for the duration of the conference, and would provide opportunities for the networking and business partnership building between laboratory professionals and laboratory equipment manufacturers/vendors.

The 3-day conference will be opened with a cocktail, on the 3rd of September 2019; and rounded up with a dinner and awards/fund raising night, on the last day of the conference. There would also be entertainments by cultural troupes and guest artists.

On Friday September 4th, there would be a guided tour to the National Reference Laboratory (NRL), and the Defense Reference Laboratory (DRL) in Abuja; as well as visits to tourist sites in the capital city of its environs.

There would also be a “blood donor drive”, in collaboration with the NBTS, a “road show” and “Walk for Health” activities as part of the conference.