ODIN-MPox

The challenge

Pathogen surveillance traditionally draws on analysis of clinical samples collected from patients. Complementary information can be obtained from environmental samples, which are relatively easy to collect and analyse and can provide a broad overview of where a pathogen is circulating and whether infection levels are rising or falling. One advantage of this approach is that it measures the total viral ‘load’ in a community, including that deriving from asymptomatic infections.

The ODIN project was one of six funded by the Global Health EDCTP3 programme to help build capacity for genomic surveillance of priority pathogens in sub-Saharan Africa. It is helping three countries – Burkina Faso, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Tanzania – introduce genomics-based wastewater surveillance. 

The project

In response to the mpox outbreak in the DRC and other sub-Saharan African countries, the ODIN-Mpox project is expanding its work to include mpox, having initially focused solely on bacterial pathogens. The project is working closely with national public health laboratories to integrate genomic wastewater and environmental surveillance into routine public health activities.

The project is using the same approach adapted to mpox, with sensitive molecular methods to quantify the amount of viral genetic material in wastewater and other environmental samples from a range of locations. This genetic material is also sequenced to provide information on the specific mpox virus variants present in samples.   

An automated data-processing pipeline is being developed alongside a dashboard to communicate results to public health partners as rapidly and accessibly as possible. The project’s work draws on stakeholder consultations and landscaping carried out in the initial ODIN project. This project has also been developing a mobile laboratory, which will enable on-the-spot analyses to be carried out in remote locations, and will help to identify sources of pathogen contamination. This, too, will be adapted to facilitate mpox analyses.

ODIN-Mpox is one of nine projects funded through an emergency call for proposals launched in response to the mpox outbreak in the DRC and other sub-Saharan African countries, which was declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) by WHO and a Public Health Emergency of Continental Security (PHECS) by Africa CDC in 2024.

Impact

The ODIN-Mpox project will add a valuable additional dimension to mpox surveillance. It will:

• Provide additional insights into trends in mpox circulation, providing an early warning of hotspots to inform disease control responses, including targeting of vaccination.
• Generate sequence data on mpox and help to identify sub-lineages having the greatest impact, with sequence information shared with global repositories.
• Create tools to provide additional insights into the properties and transmission of the virus, and to track the impact of disease control activities.
• Strengthen the capacity of national public health laboratories to carry out genomic surveillance on viral pathogens.

Using the original ODIN project infrastructure as a springboard, the ODIN-Mpox project will rapidly establish systems to monitor mpox presence in the DRC and two other nearby countries, providing public health officials with key information to guide disease control strategies.