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Rospotrebnadzor Head Anna Popova held a panel session with representatives of African countries on combating epidemics

As part of the Second Russia–Africa Summit and Economic and Humanitarian Forum, Anna Popova, Head of Rospotrebnadzor, held a panel session entitled ‘From Aid to Partnership: Working Together to Fight Epidemics’. The following participants joined the discussion: Jane Ruth Aceng, Minister of Health of the Republic of Uganda; Sylvie Nzeyimana, Minister of Public Health and the Fight Against AIDS of the Republic of Burundi; Nicaise Ndembi, Senior Advisor, Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention; Igor Borisevich, Deputy Head, Federal Medical-Biological Agency of the Russian Federation; Vladimir Kutyrev, Director, Russian Anti-Plague Scientific Research Institute “Microbe”; Alexander Semyonov, Director, Scientific Research Institute of Viral Infections “Virome”; and Vasily Akimkin, Director, Central Research Institute of Epidemiology.

Opening the meeting, the Head of Rospotrebnadzor noted that Russia and Africa successfully cooperate in epidemic prevention and actively implement joint projects to prevent and combat infections.

“Cooperation between Russia and Africa has a long history and is capable of moving from assistance to partnership between countries, which will help the continent to gain sovereignty in the field of biological security, strengthen its own potential and remove obstacles to economic development caused by infections,” noted Anna Popova.

The main topics of the session included planning and conducting joint research, test and vaccine development, training, and laboratory infrastructure development in the partner countries. The session participants discussed, among other things, how to ensure the independence of African countries from external assistance in biosecurity, as well as the possibilities of transition from importing anti-epidemic technologies to their development by African countries.

During the session, Jane Ruth Aceng, Minister of Health of the Republic of Uganda, emphasized that the partnership will help to promote cooperation in epidemic control, build human capacity, and ensure technology transfer.

For his part, Nicaise Ndembi, Senior Advisor, Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, noted that only proactive action on the continent will successfully tackle the epidemics.

Concluding the panel discussion, the Head of Rospotrebnadzor invited the participants to work on holding a similar event to combat epidemics in Africa.

At the end of the session, the parties noted the need to deepen cooperation in ensuring sanitary and epidemiological well-being of the population, responding to infectious threats, developing human resources and laboratory infrastructure.

The Roscongress Foundation is the organizer of the Second Russia–Africa Summit and Economic and Humanitarian Forum.

Official website: summitafrica.ru

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“We highly value the results of our joint work at the summit. I am sure the achieved results are creating a good foundation for further deepening the Russia-Africa partnership in the interests of our nations’ prosperity and wellbeing.”

President of the Russian Federation
Vladimir Putin

The Russia–Africa Summit, which is taking place in Sochi on 23–24 October 2019, encapsulates the historically friendly relations between the African continent and the Russian Federation. This Summit carries great significance as it is the first of its kind to emerge during a period of major global and international transformations. In response to the aspirations of the people it is representing, the Summit intends to build a comprehensive framework for expanding Russian–African relations into broader horizons of joint cooperation across different fields.

The African nations and Russia share a common understanding of international relations, based on the principles of respect for the rule of international law, equality, non-interference in the internal affairs of states, and the peaceful resolution of disputes. Both sides affirm their commitment to support multilateral actions to oppose new international threats, be they terrorism and extremism in all their forms, or declining growth rates. The two sides share a firm conviction regarding the importance of developing trade flows and supporting mutual investment in such a way as to ensure security, peace and development for the African and Russian people.

African countries have huge potential and opportunities that will allow them, once efforts to streamline their economies have been achieved, to emerge as real global players. In recent years, the nations of this continent have achieved major successes spanning the political, economic, social and administrative spheres. Africa has flourished in terms of growth over the past decade, reaching a continent-wide growth rate of 3.55% in 2018.

The African Union Summit, which was held in Niger in July 2019, continued the efforts of the African countries and saw the African Continental Free Trade Agreement come into force, along with its operational instruments. The agreement is one of the key objectives of Agenda 2063, an African development strategy that has been created to address the African people’s desire for prosperity and decent living standards.

These successes are opening up wide-ranging prospects for cooperation between African countries and the Russian Federation, and confirm the determination of African governments and their people to cooperate with multiple partners in order to establish mutually beneficial relations.

With this in mind, we express our hopes that the Russia–Africa Summit will help in the establishment of constructive strategic relations, based on partnership between two sides across various fields, and in the service of fulfilling the hopes and aspirations of the African people and their friends in Russia.

President of the Arab Republic of Egypt
Abdelfattah ALSISI