NIH has launched a $58 Million initiative to advance data science, catalyze innovation, and spur health discoveries across Africa. The five year program, Harnessing Data Science for Health Discovery, and Innovation in Africa (DS-I Africa) https://commonfund.nih.gov/AfricaData will use existing data and technologies to develop solutions for the continent’s most pressing clinical and public health problems.
DS-I Africa is a NIH Common Fund Program guided by a working group led by the Office of the Director, Fogarty International Center, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, National Institute of Mental Health, and the National Library of Medicine.
According to NIH Director, Francis S. Collins, M.D., PhD, “Many years of investing in research infrastructure by NIH and other organizations in Africa have produced an opportunity for substantial technical innovation. By forming a robust network of public and private partners, we believe this initiative can transform the field and pay huge dividends. This can include deploying low-cost technologies to improve healthcare in remote areas and developing skilled scientists who can mine vast data collections to make discoveries that will improve health for us all.”
NIH is calling for applications for an open data science platform and coordinating center to develop and maintain a data-sharing gateway for existing resources plus for new data generated by the DS-I Africa research hubs. The coordinating center will provide the organizational framework for the direction and management of the initiative’s common activities.
The research hubs are intended to become recognized centers of excellence in data science and their research training programs will produce rigorous research designs, methods, and analytic techniques, plus provide interdisciplinary research experience so trainees will have the ability to develop novel data science solutions.
The program is going to support research into key Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications (ELSI) such as data privacy and ownership, cybersecurity, and sensitivities concerning the use of geospatial information for research purposes or for public health surveillance.
The DS-I Africa program aims for new results in software solutions and technologies, to help produce start-ups and spinoff companies, but also looks to partner with governments and businesses. Potential research topics can include development of artificial intelligence tools to advance decision support for mobile and other point-of-care technologies, establish shared platforms to leverage large health data sets to reveal disease patterns and risks, and develop computational approaches and data sharing to accelerate discovery of new diagnostics, treatments, and vaccines.
Applications are due in late 2020 with projects slated to begin September 2021. Go to https://commonfund.nih.gov/africadatasymposium for more information on the NIH virtual symposium platform along with information on networking tools and for other online events to continue through November.