Health Research: Experts Seek Local Solutions, Sustainable Funding

Health experts have demanded increased domestic investment in research and the development of locally driven solutions to address Nigeria and Africa’s public health challenges.

They also stressed the need for African countries to generate and use local data in developing research interventions and technologies, saying reliance on externally generated evidence could limit the effectiveness of health policies and programmes.

The experts spoke at the fourth Annual Scientific Symposium of the International Research Centre of Excellence (IRCE), Institute of Human Virology Nigeria (IHVN), held in Abuja, with the theme: “Shaping the Future of Public Health Research: Sustainable Funding, AI/ML and Innovation.”

The executive director of IRCE, Prof. Alash’le Abimiku, said the symposium, which began in 2023, was established to stimulate interaction among researchers, government, academia, industry and other stakeholders towards research activities and policies that would benefit local communities and the wider world.

Abimiku said the increasing constraints on traditional funding mechanisms, coupled with growing demands for measurable research impact, required African researchers to rethink how research was conceived, funded, conducted and implemented.

She said sustainable research ecosystems could not depend solely on external support, stressing the need for strategic national investment, partnerships and policies that prioritise research as a driver of development.

According to her, stronger investment would help build resilient institutions capable of conducting high-quality and sustained research.

Abimiku also highlighted the growing role of artificial intelligence and machine learning in public health research, saying the technologies could strengthen disease surveillance, improve diagnostics, predict outbreaks and optimise health systems.

She, however, stressed that such technologies must be developed and applied ethically, transparently and equitably, adding that AI should complement human expertise rather than replace human judgement, compassion and contextual understanding.

Delivering the keynote address, renowned virologist and former vice chancellor of Redeemer’s University, Prof. Oyewale Tomori, said the use of emerging technologies should ultimately be about achieving better results, faster and more efficiently.

Tomori said AI could help researchers and policymakers access and analyse large volumes of information that might otherwise be difficult to obtain.

He noted that the application of AI should not be restricted to healthcare, as information from sectors such as water, roads and other infrastructure could also help improve public health outcomes.

“For instance, if you give your people access to water, it will reduce the effects of waterborne diseases. If you do your roads, it means people can get quick access to services,” he said.

Meanwhile, Associate Professor of Infectious Disease and Genomics at Adeleke University, Dr. Kolawole Oladipo, called for the development of African technologies using African datasets.

Oladipo, who spoke on leveraging AI in whole genome sequencing, said the technology could support the development of biologics, therapeutics and diagnostics.

He said adoption of AI in genomic research remained limited because most available systems were developed in Western countries.

“We need African AI that is developed using African data set and is reported to Africans, so that most of the results that we have from that AI will be tailored to the usage of African population,” he said.