The West African Health Organisation (WAHO) and international health partners are seeking a sustainable financing framework to accelerate the development of a Lassa fever vaccine and strengthen West Africa’s preparedness for future epidemic threats.
The initiative will be discussed at a high-level roundtable scheduled for Sunday, October 11, on the sidelines of the World Health Summit in Berlin, Germany.
The meeting will focus on mobilising financial commitments for vaccine research, late-stage clinical development, research preparedness and regional manufacturing capacity.
Lassa fever remains a major public health concern in West Africa, where recurrent outbreaks and limited commercial incentives for developing vaccines against epidemic diseases have underscored the need for coordinated public and private investment.
The roundtable is being convened by IAVI, MedAccess and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), with support from WAHO and the German development agency, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ). Funding support is being provided by Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
Participants are expected to review progress on the proposed financing framework, define the roles of participating institutions and identify concrete next steps, including potential funding commitments.
WAHO said it would use the engagement to advance the priorities of member states of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), particularly regional ownership, coordinated investment and sustainable financing for Lassa fever vaccine preparedness.
The organisation will be represented by its Director of Healthcare Services, Dr Virgil Lokossou, who is expected to highlight how investments in vaccine development could strengthen clinical research, laboratory infrastructure, disease surveillance, regulatory systems and regional capacity to respond to future epidemics.
The initiative builds on a ministerial roundtable held in September 2025 in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, which WAHO convened in collaboration with the governments of Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria.
The meeting brought together health ministers and representatives from 11 West African countries and produced a communiqué supporting the advancement of IAVI’s recombinant vesicular stomatitis virus (rVSV) Lassa fever vaccine candidate as a regional pathfinder.
The communiqué also called for the mobilisation of national, regional and international resources through a collaborative co-financing approach to support vaccine development.
Following the meeting, WAHO led a regional Demand Forecasting Working Group tasked with developing projections to inform the vaccine investment case.
The projections draw on consultations with participating countries, expert interviews, inputs from key informants and contributions from national Lassa fever task forces.
The proposed financing framework is expected to pool contributions from governments, philanthropic organisations and other funding partners to support the advancement of Lassa fever vaccine candidates.
IAVI’s investigational rVSV Lassa fever vaccine candidate, supported by CEPI and the European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP), is among the initiatives highlighting the importance of sustained investment in vaccine research, clinical trials and regional manufacturing capacity.
Beyond Lassa fever, the partners believe the proposed financing model could offer a framework for mobilising resources to develop vaccines against other priority epidemic diseases, particularly those for which commercial incentives remain limited.
The closed-door roundtable is scheduled to hold from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. Central European Summer Time at the Pullman Berlin Schweizerhof in Germany.
