Navigating Virology’s Frontiers in Africa: Global Virus Network 2024 Durban Meeting

TL;DR

This paper summarizes the 2024 Global Virus Network meeting in Durban, focusing on African virology research and pandemic preparedness.

Contribution

The paper emphasizes the importance of global partnerships in virology research and highlights African contributions to pandemic preparedness.

Findings

The meeting highlighted African diseases and investigators, emphasizing local expertise in global health.

Discussions focused on pandemic preparedness and the need for collaborative research on virus origins and treatments.

Innovative strategies for vaccine development and field control of viral diseases were presented.

Abstract

The Global Virus Network (GVN) is a voluntary consortium of virology laboratories and affiliated scientists that seek to prevent and control global viral threats. The meetings of the GVN are characterized by academic, health center, government, and industry participation, sharing information that is designed to further the mutual mission. In September 2024, the meeting in Durban, South Africa, highlighted diseases and investigators from Africa, and paid special attention to pandemic preparedness. Selected highlights from the meeting are presented here, along with a call-to-action in defense of global partnerships for research in the origins of human and animal viruses, the risk to humans from other animal sources, the pathogenesis of given viruses, and their prevention and treatment. Discussions of laboratory discovery science are juxtaposed with development of vaccines, antiviral drugs, immunotherapies, and innovative field strategies for control of viral diseases.

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