ECDC concludes technical visit to Albania to enhance surveillance of communicable diseases
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) completed a technical visit to Albania as part of its efforts to bolster the surveillance of communicable diseases in the country.
The visit took place from 27th to 28th of February and aimed to gain insight into Albania's national surveillance systems, identify progress and areas for improvement and explore potential avenues for ECDC support.
The ECDC team engaged in discussions with Albanian counterparts on existing disease surveillance structures, systems, processes, and capacities. The agenda included sessions on data collection, validation, management, analysis, and dissemination, as well as outbreak detection and investigation.
Both parties exchanged valuable insights and experiences, paving the way for collaborative efforts to strengthen Albania's disease surveillance systems. During the discussions, the importance of aligning Albania's surveillance practices with EU standards and practices on cross-border health threats was emphasised.
The Albanian partners appreciated ECDC's support in reviewing their surveillance systems and highlighted the significance of the visit in identifying areas for future support.
The visit concluded with a debriefing session where observations and recommendations were summarised, outlining potential next steps and priorities where further work and ECDC support would be required to implement the EU acquis on serious cross-border health threats and related ECDC standards and practices.
Background
The cooperation with the Western Balkans and Türkiye is reviewed, defined, and planned by ECDC through the network of officially nominated National ECDC Correspondents, especially during discussions in annual meetings.
ECDC, under the coordination of the National ECDC Correspondents, has been working with national authorities in EU enlargement countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo[1], Montenegro, Serbia, North Macedonia, and Türkiye) to support and strengthen their capacity for their future participation in ECDC. In the framework of ECDC technical cooperation activities supported by the European Commission under the consecutive projects financed from the Instrument of Pre-accession Assistance (IPA), representatives from the countries participate as observers in ECDC activities, meetings, networks, and technical discussions related to epidemic intelligence, threat detection, communicable disease surveillance and control, preparedness, and response.
[1] This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.
