Michèle Ramsay, Amelia C Crampin, Ayaga A Bawah, Evelyn Gitau, Kobus Herbst
{"title":"The Value Proposition of Coordinated Population Cohorts Across Africa.","authors":"Michèle Ramsay, Amelia C Crampin, Ayaga A Bawah, Evelyn Gitau, Kobus Herbst","doi":"10.1146/annurev-biodatasci-020722-015026","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Building longitudinal population cohorts in Africa for coordinated research and surveillance can influence the setting of national health priorities, lead to the introduction of appropriate interventions, and provide evidence for targeted treatment, leading to better health across the continent. However, compared to cohorts from the global north, longitudinal continental African population cohorts remain scarce, are relatively small in size, and lack data complexity. As infections and noncommunicable diseases disproportionately affect Africa's approximately 1.4 billion inhabitants, African cohorts present a unique opportunity for research and surveillance. High genetic diversity in African populations and multiomic research studies, together with detailed phenotyping and clinical profiling, will be a treasure trove for discovery. The outcomes, including novel drug targets, biological pathways for disease, and gene-environment interactions, will boost precision medicine approaches, not only in Africa but across the globe.</p>","PeriodicalId":29775,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Biomedical Data Science","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":7.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Annual Review of Biomedical Data Science","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-biodatasci-020722-015026","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"MATHEMATICAL & COMPUTATIONAL BIOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Building longitudinal population cohorts in Africa for coordinated research and surveillance can influence the setting of national health priorities, lead to the introduction of appropriate interventions, and provide evidence for targeted treatment, leading to better health across the continent. However, compared to cohorts from the global north, longitudinal continental African population cohorts remain scarce, are relatively small in size, and lack data complexity. As infections and noncommunicable diseases disproportionately affect Africa's approximately 1.4 billion inhabitants, African cohorts present a unique opportunity for research and surveillance. High genetic diversity in African populations and multiomic research studies, together with detailed phenotyping and clinical profiling, will be a treasure trove for discovery. The outcomes, including novel drug targets, biological pathways for disease, and gene-environment interactions, will boost precision medicine approaches, not only in Africa but across the globe.
期刊介绍:
The Annual Review of Biomedical Data Science provides comprehensive expert reviews in biomedical data science, focusing on advanced methods to store, retrieve, analyze, and organize biomedical data and knowledge. The scope of the journal encompasses informatics, computational, artificial intelligence (AI), and statistical approaches to biomedical data, including the sub-fields of bioinformatics, computational biology, biomedical informatics, clinical and clinical research informatics, biostatistics, and imaging informatics. The mission of the journal is to identify both emerging and established areas of biomedical data science, and the leaders in these fields.