Project Title: Donation for COVID-19 Pandemic Emergency Measures in Tanzania
Project Description: The Ministry of Health of the Government of Tanzania and the Ministry of Health of the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar has launched efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The fight against COVID-19 is not the responsibility of the Governments alone, but it is the responsibility of everyone including private and non-for-profit organizations. The initial budget required to support the National response plan was over 200 Billion Shillings (100 Million US $). In order to support... The Ministry of Health of the Government of Tanzania and the Ministry of Health of the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar has launched efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The fight against COVID-19 is not the responsibility of the Governments alone, but it is the responsibility of everyone including private and non-for-profit organizations. The initial budget required to support the National response plan was over 200 Billion Shillings (100 Million US $). In order to support the National efforts (both in the Zanzibar and Mainland) to fight COVID-19 Pandemic, the Embassy pf Switzerland identified current project partners who have the immediate capacity to support the efforts of the two governments. The Ifakara Health Institute has the strong technical expertise and operational capacity to scale-up the national diagnostic capacity two to three-fold by making available its laboratories to the National Laboratory. The IHI Bagamoyo Branch laboratory is certified by National Laboratory as a COVID-19 testing site. Jointly with the Foundation Botnar based in Basel, the Embassy of Switzerland and Botnar will make available an additional 950,000 US$ to IHI for it to urgently purchase additional RT-PCR equipment and reagents. This will allow the decentralization of testing to ten additional testing locations, including one location in Zanzibar. The National Health Laboratory Quality Assurance and Training Centre (NHQATC) located at NIMR HQs in Dar es Salaam will manage this scale-up of testing locations. The NHQATC has identified 8 laboratories located at NIMR Amani (Tanga), Mbeya, Muhimbili centers, Dodoma, KCMC Moshi, and IHI Bagamoyo where molecular technology exists, and the use of RT-PCR is regularly performed for scientific studies. The identified labs will provide additional technical expertise to operate on behalf of the National Laboratory the decentralized COVID-19 testing. In Zanzibar, IHI technical staff will establish the island's first testing center at Biosafety 2+ lever in collaboration with the United States CDC. Thus, IHI will procure the required equipment through the international supply channel with guidance from the Director of the National Laboratories. This procurement will increase within a few weeks of testing capability by 10,000 tests. The Monitoring or the Procurement process will be through the IHI Finance-Audit-Risk Committee (FARC), and the procurement is expected to be completed in a maximum of 12 weeks.
Principal Investigator : Ally Olotu
Department Name : BRCT
Time frame: (2020-04-04) - (2020-12-31)
Botnar Foundation (Normal)
External Collaborating Partners
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