African Networks for Health Research and Development (AFRO-NETS)
From TrustAfrica wiki - African Regional Organizations
African Networks for Health Research and Development (AFRO-NETS)
Dr. Brian Pazvakavambwa
c/o GTZ Office, 1 Orange Grove Drive, Highlands
P.O. Box 2406, Harare, Zimbabwe
Telephone: +263-(0)4-496723
Fax: +263-(0)4-495628
Email: pazvakavambwab@zw.afro.who.int / info@afronets.org
Website: http://www.afronets.org
Description
The electronic conference for the African Networks for Health Research & Development was established in 1997 to facilitate exchange of information among different African networks—NGOs, research centers and governmental organizations active in health research for development in anglophone Africa, and to facilitate collaboration in the fields of capacity building, planning, and research. Some of the sectors where AFRO-NETS is involved include Advocacy; Children/Youth; Education/Training; HIV/AIDS; Health; Peer Education; Poverty Alleviation; Research/Documentation/Information Dissemination; Sexual Rights/Sexuality/Sexual Orientation; and Women.
Participating networks include African Malaria Vaccine Testing Network, Blair Research Institute - Zimbabwe, Biomedical Research & Training Institute, Commonwealth Regional Health Community Secretariat, Council on Health Research for Development, Health Systems Research for Reproductive Health & Health Care Reforms in the Eastern & Southern Africa Region, Health Systems Trust - South Africa, Independent Group for Health in Africa, International Health Policy Program, International Clinical Epidemiology Network, International Development Research Centre - Canada, Joint Program on Health Systems Research, Medical and Actuarial Research Foundation - Zimbabwe, Medical Research Council of South Africa, Medical Research Council of Zimbabwe, Regional Network on Equity in Health (EQUINET), Scientists for Health And Research for Development (SHARED) and Social Science and Medicine Africa Network.
Track Record
Avoiding the need to reinvent the wheel was one of the reasons for the establishment of AFRO-NETS, which to date is composed of 20 networks and institutions. This network has set up an electronic conference with more than 1,100 direct subscribers in Africa, the United States, Europe, Asia and South America. In Africa, messages are fed into local HealthNet nodes from where they are distributed to countrywide mailing systems (e.g., in Zimbabwe to more than 300 subscribers of HealthNet Zimbabwe). Traffic on the electronic conference is moderate to high, depending on the topic of discussion, with the average number of contributions being four to six per day. The discussion topics deal with every aspect of Health Research in Africa, from AIDS to capacity building, from the Internet and traditional healers to Zambian women groups. AFRO-NETS created a digest that collects about 40 KB of messages distributed to the subscribers once or twice a week. All contributions made to the electronic conference are archived and are searchable by keywords and retrieved via the integrated search engine.
In addition, research proposals, research results and so on are stored at the central AFRO-NETS computer and can be retrieved via the Internet and e-mail. HealthNet/SatelLife in the US, which hosts a homepage for AFRO-NETS, has developed a free GetWeb service that allows anyone with an e-mail account to download documents from the World Wide Web. This is important for health workers with no direct Internet connection (still the majority in Africa) who can now even do a MEDLINE search via e-mail.
