Laboratory is one of the core capacities that countries must develop for the implementation of the International Health Regulations (IHR[2005]) since laboratory services play a major role in all the key processes of detection, assessment, response, notification, and monitoring of events. While developed countries easily adapt their well-organized routine laboratory services, resource-limited countries need considerable capacity building as many gaps still exist. In this paper, we discuss some of the efforts made by the African Field Epidemiology Network (AFENET) in supporting laboratory capacity development in the Africa region. The efforts range from promoting graduate level training programs to building advanced technical, managerial and leadership skills to in-service short course training for peripheral laboratory staff. A number of specific projects focus on external quality assurance, basic laboratory information systems, strengthening laboratory management towards accreditation, equipment calibration, harmonization of training materials, networking and provision of pre-packaged laboratory kits to support outbreak investigation. Available evidence indicates a positive effect of these efforts on laboratory capacity in the region. However, many opportunities exist, especially to support the roll-out of these projects as well as attending to some additional critical areas such as biosafety and biosecuity. We conclude that AFENET’s approach of strengthening national and sub-national systems provide a model that could be adopted in resource-limited settings such as sub-Saharan Africa.

Background Road crashes continue to persist on Ugandan roads despite the government’s commendable efforts over many years. This study sought to explore the persistent causes of road crashes, suggest recommendations and evaluate the costs incurred by the government for treating accident victims. Methods A rapid cross-sectional study involving both quantitative and qualitative study approaches was performed. Desk reviews and six key informant interviews were conducted with traffic police officers and hospital administrators. Traffic road accident data were abstracted from the Uganda Police Force database for the period of January 2021 to February 2022, to ascertain the magnitude of the problem and its causes. Results The causes of road accidents are mainly caused by to human error, weather and the poor state of some roads. The government spends reasonable amounts of money in treating accident victims, at USD 245–3590, yet the funds could instead be used to promote socio-economic development in communities. Conclusion Road crashes continue to occur in Uganda, mainly because of human error. We recommend amelioration of the identified causes of road traffic crashes to save lives and conserve limited public resources.

Road crashes continue to persist on Ugandan roads even with the commendable efforts that the government has been implementing for so many years. This study sought to explore the persistent causes of road crashes, suggest recommendations and evaluate the cost of treating accident victims by government. Methods: A rapid cross-sectional study involving both quantitative and qualitative study approaches was used. Desk reviews and 6 key informant interviews were conducted with Traffic Police Officers; Hospital Administrators.Traffic road accidents data was abstracted from the Uganda Police Force Database for the period of January 2021 to February 2022, to ascertain the magnitude of the problem and its causes. Results The causes of road accidents are mainly due to human error, weather and poor state of some roads. The government spends a lot to treat accident victims between Ug shs 930,000 to Ug sh 13,660,000 and yet this money could have been used to promote socio-economic development in the communities. Conclusion: Road crashes continue to occur in Uganda mainly due to human error. Suggested interventions have to be focused on addressing these identified causes to help in reducing the high costs of treatment of these victims that government incurs daily.

Introduction Edubee, a holistic learning approach for Ugandan students is an initiative Pic-Ed. Pic-Ed is an educational company that provides digital learning materials for students, learning management systems for schools and institutions plus examination proctoring tools. The project was undertaken to determine the effectiveness of digital learning platform by Edubee in enhancing the educational level achievement of Senior three students in selected districts in Uganda.MethodsWe designed a three-armed field trial which was piloted in the Central and Eastern regions of Uganda.The pilot study was conducted among Senior Three students in 12 randomly selected schools and the content was from the Senior Biology and Physics syllabus. The topics chosen for Physics were vapour pressure and heat quantities, for Biology, the topics chosen were seed dormancy, seed germination and factors affecting seed germination.The three study arms were; (A) Teacher and Edubee Platform; this arm involved the teacher explaining concepts to the students using the Edubee platform that would either be hosted in a school computer lab or would be pre-uploaded on the research team’s tablets and MP3 players, (B) Edubee only; this arm involved the students navigating the content of the Edubee platform at their pace and doing self-teaching without the aid of the teacher to). Both rural and urban districts, the students used the Edubee platform or the MP3 players and (C) Teacher only; this consisted of the teacher using the conventional syllabus notes which are in-line with the national curriculum development centre. The sample size for the study was 360 students from 12 schools in the two regions. Thirty students were randomly sampled from each school. Each of the sampled students was subjected to both a baseline and an endline assessment which were marked by experienced Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB) examiners). The study was carried out in two weeks (28th February to 10th March 2022). ResultsThe total number of respondents of the study was 360 and of these, 41.6%were male and females were 58.4%. Those aged 15-16 years constituted the highest percentage at 49% and many identified with the Catholic religion at37%. Slightly above average of the participants were from the urban based schools at 59.3% and those who were in the boarding section constituted 71.6% of the total sample size. The enrolment for arm A was 33.2%, arm B (34.4%) and arm C was 32.4% of the total number of respondents. The results showed the mean performance at the endline assessment to be at 22.4%, standard deviation 7.26 and was higher than the baseline which was at 15.8%, standard deviation 12.53. On further analysis, it was noted that the odd ratio of passing an examination in arm B was 0.344 (0.173, 0.767, p= 0.006) compared to arm C 0.845 (0.4150, 1.719, p= 0.642). Factors that were associated with positive outcomes of using e-learning outcomes included; a school being located in an urban setting (p=0.002), a learner’s parent being a business person as the occupation (p=0.001), being located in Eastern region (p=0.000) and having a policy on e-learning was statistically significant during the multivariate logistic regression analysis.ConclusionThe Edubee platform is a effective learning resource for learners that should be scaled up for a longer period of time to ensure that learners master and understand the concepts better. The Edubee platform should be used as a supplementary tool where the teacher uses the audio-visual components of Edubee to enhance their explanations for science subject concepts. The stakeholders should integrate digital learning as a major component for the new national education curriculum, enact laws and pass policies on digital learning at school and national levels.