The Republic of Mozambique, a Portuguese-speaking country of 28 million people on the southeast coast of Africa, has experienced significant economic growth and distinct progress in improving health indicators over the past two decades. Since the end of a devastating civil war in 1992, health has been a government priority, particularly in response to the crushing burden of HIV/AIDS (the 2015 national prevalence was estimated at 13.2% among adults aged 15-49 years).

Building on the partnership with University of Liberia, College of Health Sciences (ULCHS), the Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health (VIGH) will develop a develop a one-year research ethics education program for members of four institutional review boards (IRBs) in Monrovia, Liberia. Research education and training activities will adapt to the Liberian context from the well-established Collaborative Research Ethics Education (Formação Colaborativa em Etica na Pesquisa, FoCEP) Program for Mozambique.

The UEM Partnership for Research in Implementation Science in Mozambique (PRISM) program supports a partnership between VIGH and University Eduardo Mondlane (UEM) in Mozambique to build upon the successes of the first five year grant and continues to build research capacity and conduct HIV-focused implementation science research at UEM.

Project Summary/ Abstract: The recent Ebola epidemic exposed the fragility of Sierra Leone´s health system and highlighted the inadequate investments to date that are needed to support a well-functioning system capable of responding to a disease outbreak of this magnitude.

The goal of the program is to build capacity for research ethics training and education in Mozambican academic institutions and other Portuguese speaking African countries, namely Angola and Cape Verde.  Support will be given for foreign graduate students to pursue PhD training in Applied Ethics as well as an executive Research Ethics Certificate course on the principles of ethics applicable to resource-limited countries.