At the end of the project, Pacific Island countries will have a cadre of well-trained field epidemiologists who can conduct co-ordinated disease surveillance and outbreak investigation, as well as carry out research to inform local and regional health priorities.

APCOVE will bring together 40 experts from veterinary schools across Australia, New Zealand, the United States and the Asia-Pacific to design open source, online training modules and case studies, that will be used to train veterinarians in core epidemiological skills. The modules and case studies will teach several of the World Organisation for Animal Health’s Critical Competencies of the Performance of Veterinary Services, building skills in outbreak investigation and response; surveillance and data analysis; risk assessment and disease control; one health and biosecurity and leadership and communication.

Across the Indo-Pacific, gaps in workforce capacity present a major health security threat. Australians have great expertise to offer countries across the Indo-Pacific in preventing, detecting and responding to infectious disease threats. The Health Security Corps was established to deploy volunteers and build capacity for the prevention, detection and control of infectious disease.

Epidemiologists play a critical role in national and regional health security. Sometimes known as “disease detectives”, epidemiologists collect and analyse data from the field to understand the causes of infectious disease outbreaks and advise on containment measures.