External Quality Assurance in Asia (EQAsia) - phase 2

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Delivering technical assistance and support for External Quality Assurance in South and South East Asia

This grant helps improve quality assurance of laboratory testing in Asia. Quality assurance is commonly acknowledged best practice and underpins confidence in the results of a laboratory. AMR surveillance systems must have external quality assurance (EQA) for bacteria identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing, which tests how well antibiotic drugs are working. However, EQA is expensive and the expertise required is not regularly accessible to many laboratories in low- and middle-income countries. The Fleming Fund grants aim to strengthen EQA in these two critical areas - bacteria identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing.

Grantee:

Technical University of Denmark (DTU)

Sub-Grantees:

IVI, Chulalongkorn University Veterinary School (CUVET), National Institute of Health of Thailand (NIH), University of Melbourne (UoM) Doherty Institute

Duration:

Nov 2023 - Dec 2025

Value:

£2,497,995

Countries:

Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Timor-Leste, Vietnam

Objectives

• Establish sustainable access to EQA in Asia and support supranational quality assurance.
• Training and Technical Assistance to microbiology at National Reference Laboratories.
• Support the expansion of WGS for antimicrobial resistance surveillance in Asia