Effective control of tropical diseases requires environmental monitoring, monitoring the interaction between the human population and the environment, rapid timely response to disease outbreaks, and effective diagnosis and treatment. An approach that collects, integrates, and transmits information across the various processes involved in these tasks has the potential to transformatively impact the effectiveness of disease control efforts.  From a technical perspective, we use Internet of Things (IoT) techniques, Data Science approaches, and Mobile Computing techniques. To effectively harness these tools to improve human, animal and environmental health, a strong network of experts in each field must be firmly established. Subsequently, these experts will spread the knowledge under a One Health approach.                                                                     

The network facilitates the exchange of expertise among the partners in order to profit from each other’s knowledge and to implement local pools of expertise in the participating organizations for the sake of the sustainability of the measures taken by the network. Initial members of the network include the Southeast Asia One Health University Network, Ministry of Public Health of Thailand, Ministry of Agriculture of Thailand, Vietnam National University of Agriculture, and VetAgro Sup in France.                                                                        

Specific activities are being carried out in the areas of teaching and research.  Course material in advanced information technology as it applies to tropical medicine is being developed with participation of practitioners and integrated into the Master of Public Health Informatics online master program of Mahidol’s Faculty of Tropical Medicine.  The course material will be made freely available online.  To build research capacity, joint research projects have been established in areas such as dengue diagnosis decision support, dengue prognostic prediction, modeling human mobility related to disease transmission, sensor networks for mosquito population monitoring, and collaborative virtual environments for disease control decision support. Showcase translational projects have been developed to teach translational skills.  These include a dengue diagnostic decision support systems being pilot tested in Mahidol University’s Hospital for Tropical Diseases, a system for dengue case investigation being pilot tested by the dept. of disease control in Chonburi, Thailand, and a system to support vaccine trials, already used to support the phase 1 and 2 trials of Thailand’s ChulaCov19 Covid vaccine.  Annual workshops and summer schools are used for project coordination and capacity building.  Meetings and courses make use of online platforms as much as possible to facilitate participation from a geographically diverse audience.

Workshops and Summer Schools:

1. Summer school Summer School on Advanced Information Technology for Tropical Medicine, University of Bremen, June – July 2022.  25 participants
2. Workshop on Intelligent Systems for Vector-Borne Disease, Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg Inst. for Advanced Study, June 2022. 20 participants
3. Summer school Summer School on Advanced Information Technology for Tropical Medicine, Mahidol University, May 2023, 160 participants.
4. Workshop on Intelligent Systems for Vector-Borne Disease, Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg Inst. for Advanced Study, July 2023. 40 participants.