EURGen-RefLabCap was initiated as a four-year project on the “provision of EU networking and support for public health reference laboratory functions for antimicrobial resistance in priority healthcare- associated infections” by the Consumers, Health, Agriculture and Food Executive Agency (CHAFEA), on behalf of the Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety (DG SANTE of the European Commission) and in close cooperation with the European Centre of Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).
Starting from 01/04/2021, CHAFEA has ceased to exist and a new agency, Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA), is taking over all related contractual obligations. The contractors for this project are the Technical University of Denmark (DTU Food, Denmark) and the Statens Serum Institut (SSI, Denmark).
This project is complementary to ECDC’s European Antimicrobial Resistance Genes Surveillance Network (EURGen-Net). It will provide capacity building activities including training, external quality assessment (EQA) schemes and networking activities to support NRLs in improving their capacities in detection, phenotypic and genotypic characterization of carbapenem- and/or colistin-resistant Enterobacterales (CCRE) and two additional healthcare-associated pathogens of public health relevance. The overall aim is to strengthen capacities for national surveillance and outbreak investigation of CCRE and improve the availability and quality of European-level molecular surveillance data.
The project will focus on antimicrobial-resistant pathogens whose predominant modes of transmission are healthcare-associated, including carbapenem- and/or colistin resistant Enterobacterales and two additional pathogens to be selected at a later stage.
Funded by the European Union Service Contract no. SC 20197401
Upcoming activities in 2024
Following is the list of activities planned for year 2024 in EURGen-RefLabCap project. Details of each activity will be added soon and invitations will be sent out via email
Date
|
Activity type
|
Description
|
| January 22, 2024 |
Online workshop |
Multidisciplinary training #4 workstream 2 (part 1) |
| February 6, 2024 |
Online workshop |
Multidisciplinary training #4 workstream 2 (part 1)
|
| February, 2024 |
Email consultation |
Report from EQA #2 (Workstream 1) + EQA #1 (Workstream 2) - 2023 |
| March, 2024 |
Survey |
Project feedback survey |
| May, 2024 |
EQA 2024 |
EQA #3 (Workstream 1) + EQA #2 (Workstream 2) - 2024 |
September 17, 2024
|
On-site workshop
|
Technical workshop with focus on discussions based on the output from pilot studies carried out by priority and additional countries. All network members will be invited
|
| September 18, 2024 |
Presentation |
Results from EQA #3 (Workstream 1) + EQA #2 (Workstream 2) - 2024
|
| September 18-19, 2024 |
Email Consultation |
Report from EQA #3 (Workstream 1) + EQA #2 (Workstream 2) - 2024 |
| October, 2024 |
On-site meeting
|
#3 Networking meeting
|
| TBD (April) |
Webinar |
Data management and sharing, and ISO principles
|
| TBD (May) |
Webinar |
Structure for EU funding by the Commission |
| TBD (June) |
Webinar |
IPSN |
| TBD (September) |
Webinar |
ONT Tools |
| October, 2024 |
Online workshop |
Multidisciplinary training #6 Workstream 1 (part 1) |
| October 2024 |
Online workshop |
Multidisciplinary training #6 Workstream 1 (part 2) |
| 24 October, 2024 |
Webinar |
Best practices in IQC. Participant’s experience with IQC |
| 20 November, 2024 |
Webinar |
Summing up, next steps for NRLs and Goodbye |