A pan-European project led by NUI Galway has reached a major milestone in strengthening the continent’s pandemic response.
The PANDEM-2 Project aims to help future proof the EU against the next potential pandemic by improving member states to respond together.
The two year project was awarded €9.7 million by the European Union, and involves academic and private sector partners in multiple countries.
A significant milestone in the project has been the launch of the first version of ‘Pandem-source’, an IT solution that will enable countries and health organisations to share data in real time.
Pandem-Source is open-source and designed to meet the specific needs of public health agencies, governments and international organisations such as the ECDC and WHO.
It enables real-time pandemic-relevant data from international systems (ECDC, TESSy), laboratory systems, social media and other systems to be easily integrated.
Professor Máire Connolly, PANDEM-2 Coordinator at NUI Galway said “I would like to acknowledge all partners involved in achieving this major milestone in the PANDEM-2 project.”
“COVID-19 has affected every corner of society and had devastating health, economic and social impacts on countries worldwide.”
“In the event of a future pandemic, we hope that the Pandem-Source tool will play a role in the conversations that public health experts and policymakers are having.”
“Pandem-Source will provide them with the comprehensive, accurate, up-to-the-minute data that they will need to make better decisions.”
Pandem-Source will feed into the upcoming ‘PANDEM-2 Dashboard’ where its components relating to situational awareness will be further developed through state-of-the-art visual analytics.
This aims to combat the deficiencies in pandemic response revealed by COVID-19, where nations largely acted individually for a lengthy period of time in Europe.
These technologies are being created and produced by project partners and experts in the field including Epiconcept (France), UCLouvain (Belgium), Clarisoft (Romania), and NUI Galway (Ireland).
‘Pandem-Source’ is available to download here, feedback is welcomed and can be sent to info@pandem-2.eu.
