Africa is home to 60% of the world's HIV/AIDS burden, 90% of its malaria cases and nearly a quarter of the globe's tuberculosis sufferers, but only a handful of clinical laboratories can properly identify and treat patients. That could soon change, however, thanks to an ambitious accreditation initiative unveiled on 27 July that seeks to double Africa's diagnostic laboratory capacity over the next two years.

Supported by the World Health Organization Regional Office for Africa (WHO/AFRO) and the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the new initiative is built upon a five-step framework that scientists believe will be crucial for its success.

Previously, African laboratories had to achieve full accreditation to be recognized. These standards sometimes seemed “ridiculously overwhelming,” leading many labs to give up before even starting the process, explains Deborah Birx, director of the Global AIDS Program at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which is helping to implement the new framework. The new initiative is built on a tiered approach that promotes encouragement. “It gives you a roadmap to implement improvement,” Birx says.

According to John Nkengasong, chief of the International Laboratory Branch at the CDC's Global AIDS Program, labs from any of the 46 African countries that are part of the WHO/AFRO network can take part, irrespective of the diseases on which they focus. In November, the CDC and the WHO plan to host a workshop to train scientists on the proposed management tools so that they can educate other scientists in their regions. Within two years, Nkengasong hopes that as many as 60 labs in sub-Saharan regions other than South Africa will be accredited, doubling the 28 that are today.

The initiative “is affordable, it's scalable, it's effective and it's not disease specific,” Nkengasong says. “All of these elements allow for sustainability.”