Awareness of the importance of global health has increased significantly as a result of the SARS-CoV2 pandemic. Demographic and economic changes in some African countries, together with the challenges posed by climate change, migration and urbanization, are creating new challenges in these regions. However, this also provides a unique opportunity to study the changing interplay between infectious and non-infectious diseases and their impact on society through interdisciplinary research.

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has powerfully demonstrated how diseases of civilization can alter the risk for infection and, conversely, how infection can cause long-lasting damage to multiple organ systems. In sub-Saharan Africa, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, pulmonary disease, neurogenerative disease, mental illness, and cancer and their specific manifestations and etiologies are generally poorly understood.

A DZG collaboration in Global Health provides a unique platform to link basic science-based research with population-based research, and with established research infrastructures in African partner institutions.