ECDC website

Our work in 2020 /

International relations

ECDC continued close collaboration with other Centres for Disease Control across the globe to share information and best practice to effectively respond to threats posed to the public health both at multilateral and bilateral level.

ECDC intensified its collaboration with other CDCs at bilateral level, especially with China and US CDCs. ECDC was in contact with both its American and Chinese counterparts from the beginning of the outbreak in Wuhan in January 2020, as well as with new international partners such as South Korea and Singapore.

2020 marked a significant milestone in the development of the ECDC and Africa CDC partnership over the last couple of years – a Contribution Agreement ‘EU for health security in Africa: ECDC for Africa CDC’ with the Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development was signed. The high-level launch event of ECDC4Africa CDC on 7 December 2020 marked the beginning of this four-year partnership project.

Developing technical cooperation and exchange of information with EU candidate and potential candidate countries and the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) partner countries is also essential. ECDC works with public health authorities in these countries to introduce them to the EU’s infectious disease surveillance and rapid alert systems and help them align with the EU acquis in the area of communicable disease prevention and control.

ECDC signed and initiated implementation of ECDC-IPA6 action ‘Preparatory measures for the participation of the Western Balkans and Turkey in the ECDC with special focus on One-Health approach against AMR, 2020 – 2022’. This project aims at preparing national authorities in EU candidate and potential candidate countries (i.e. Western Balkans and Turkey) for their participation in ECDC systems and networks and supports the advancement of One-Health approach against AMR in Western Balkans.

The ECDC-IPA6 Action covers three work streams:

  1. Supporting authorities of IPA beneficiaries to implement the EU acquis on serious cross-border threats to health;
  2. Improving the One-Health approach against antimicrobial resistance;
  3. Enhancing hospital-based SARI surveillance systems and studies to support the implementation of fit-for-purpose surveillance systems and a follow-up on vaccine effectiveness.

Under this action, ECDC initiated the integration of Western Balkans into the ECDC Viral Respiratory Diseases network and its associated COVID-Net and European Influenza Surveillance Network in 2020.

On 27 March 2020, the European Commission Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations and ECDC signed an agreement for the implementation of the new EU Initiative on Health Security, with a total budget of 9 million EUR. The aim is to enable tailor-made support to strengthen public health systems’ preparedness and response capacities of the European Union candidate and potential candidate and the European Neighbourhood Policy partner countries and improve health security in the European neighbourhood.