EU-Africa Concerted Action on SAR-CoV-2 Virus Variant and Immunological Surveillance

Despite of the successful advances achieved to date in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic with the development of vaccines and therapy, the worldwide propagation of SARS-CoV-2 has resulted in the rapid evolution of this virus and in the emergence of variants of concern (VOC) that may dampen the efficacy of the first generation vaccines. To tackle the challenges associated with the VOC, the CoVICIS program is proposing a global approach with a powerful state-of-the-art virologic and immunologic platforms coupled with large genomic surveillance studies and diverse cohorts in EU and SSA. This allows CoVICIS to contribute to the early identification of emerging VOC and address key unanswered questions regarding i) the susceptibility to infection with VOC after a prior infection in the setting of a long-COVID or after vaccination with different vaccines, ii) the risk posed by VOC in immunocompromised patients, and iii) the modalities of infection and immune responses in children. The diversity of the cohorts provides a unique opportunity to study virus evolution in different settings, where SARS-CoV-2-specific humoral and cellular immune responses are predicted to vary very significantly. Beyond the genomic surveillance, the ground-breaking research and innovation of the program is the characterization of virologic and immunologic properties of VOC and the identification of immune correlates of protection after disease or vaccination. CoVICIS’ ambitious goals are only achievable thanks to the existing population studies and cohorts funded by national and international public agencies and public-private partnerships, and the combined collective expertise of CoVICIS partners in the fields of epidemiology, genomics, virology, immunology, data science and public health.