The articles on this page bring together news, stories, and updates from the Public Health Alliance for Genomic Epidemiology (PHA4GE). They highlight our projects, collaborations, events, and milestones as we work with partners around the world to strengthen genomic epidemiology and public health practice.
Browse the posts below to explore what PHA4GE has been doing, learn about new resources and initiatives, and follow how our community is growing and evolving over time.
Meet Dr Palesa Makoti, a PHA4GE postdoctoral research fellow working to advance bioinformatics, genomics, and public health capacity in Africa and other LMICs. In this member profile, she shares her academic journey, her passion for infectious disease surveillance, and her hopes for making genomic tools more accessible for public health.
PHA4GE has welcomed its first cohort of postdoctoral research fellows to strengthen support across its working groups and driver projects. Dr Palesa Makoti, Dr Rekha Sathyan, and Dr Stanford Kwenda will contribute to key activities in pathogen genomics, including the development of the PHA4GE meningitis community standard through to the end of 2026.
Professor Alan Christoffels represented South Africa in Geneva during WHO discussions on pathogen data sharing, equitable benefit access and the PABS annex of the global pandemic agreement.
International pathogen genomics experts joined a PHA4GE and IPSN webinar to share how rapid sequencing and global collaboration helped identify Andes virus during the 2026 MV Hondius hantavirus outbreak.
PHA4GE’s Keaghan Brown joined wastewater and environmental surveillance experts in Ghana to present bioinformatics capacity-building work and help advance discussions on sustainable disease surveillance systems in Africa.
PHA4GE member Dylan Pilz won best poster presentation at the Wastewater & Environmental Surveillance Meeting 2026 in Ghana for work on rapid detection of cryptic SARS-CoV-2 variants in South African wastewater.
Global public health experts met to refine metadata standards for cholera, malaria, meningitis and neonatal sepsis, strengthening the use of pathogen genomics in outbreak response and health decision-making.
PHA4GE convened its second biennial conference in collaboration with the International Pathogen Surveillance Network (IPSN) Global Partners Forum. The joint event took place from the 27th - 29th of October 2025 at Century City Convention Centre in Cape Town, South Africa.
More than 270 scientists, policy-makers, funders and public health experts from around the world attended the third International Pathogen Surveillance Network (IPSN) Global Partners Forum in Cape Town, South Africa from 27 to 29 October 2025. The forum was held jointly with the second Public Health Alliance for Genomic Epidemiology (PHA4GE) biennial conference and was co-hosted by the WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence and WHO’s Regional Office for Africa.