Infectious diseases are so closely tied to rural poverty
that the answers to solving these challenges
are really going to come from a combination of bringing
new knowledge into settings where human behavior plays
a significant role.
I trained in Ghana, and I worked there
as a medical doctor for several years before coming to Yale.
So in a way, I had seen their problems firsthand,
especially with the health care system.
I've spent more than 20 years running my laboratory focused
on diseases that really don't occur
in the United States anymore.
And my colleague Dr. Paintsil, whose
work focuses on pediatric HIV, was also
feeling as though it was time to move from the laboratory
into epidemiology research.
Mike had been looking forward to an opportunity
to really do work in Africa.
So we just bonded on that shared vision
of one day doing work in Ghana.
It became obvious that if we really
wanted to know whether the work that we were doing
in the laboratory had direct relevance to human disease,
we had to identify a way to get into the field.
We spoke with some collaborators at the University
of Ghana Medical School and the University of Ghana itself.
And that is how the partnership started.
And so it was in 2006 that we made our first visit
to the University of Ghana in Accra
and were able to make connections
to people who were interested in developing
international collaboration.
So I was intrigued by the system at Yale
that physicians were scientists.
In most African countries, doctors see patients.
They don't do science.
We realized that there was a capacity gap
and that we would need to really grow the research capacity.
Our program in West Africa has been actively training
young scientists interested in global health research,
and even clinical work, for the past 11 years.
The trainees that we select are people
who have promise and potential to make a difference
in their countries.
We've now had about 40 trainees from Ghana.
And about 95% of them are back home in Ghana
doing research that they started off from here.
And while here, they're able to study under the guidance
of Yale faculty.
They're able to take summer courses that
are offered through the University
and use this experience to hopefully inspire
them to pursue a career in biomedical research.
Within two years, other investors have heard of us.
We got a call from King Saud University in Saudi Arabia.
They wanted to be part of our group.
And then we also connected with University
of Sao Paulo in Brazil.
We were able to share some of the work we
were doing with Ghana.
The way we set it up was actually
just building a network of premier investors
in the world to help build research capacity
and enhance sort of international understanding.
It's amazing when you bring these trainees to Yale here
over the summer.
And they interact with Yale students,
Yale post-doctoral fellows, Yale faculty.
It makes them see that, oh, yes, we can do this.
That we are about the same.
We share the same humanity and knowledge.
And then they quickly realize that it is just the resources
that they don't have.
And they go home very excited.
I think it's absolutely essential
that we be working together with investigators
from these endemic parts of the world
so that we can really make sure that we're addressing
the right questions and that we're
using all of the available knowledge to make progress.