CRDM – CENTRE FOR RESPIRATORY DISEASE AND MENINGITIS

CRDM

The Centre for Respiratory Diseases and Meningitis

The Centre for Respiratory Diseases and Meningitis (CRDM) is a resource of surveillance, diagnostics, expertise and research in the field of communicable respiratory diseases and meningitis for South Africa and the African continent.

The centre generates data and provides expertise related to respiratory diseases and meningitis of public health importance to the South African National Department of Health, health care providers, regional and international collaborators, to assist with the planning of public health policies and programmes, and response to respiratory disease and meningitis outbreaks. CRDM is also a source of capacity building and formal training within South Africa and the African region.

Objectives

To conduct surveillance for communicable respiratory diseases and meningitis within South Africa in order to provide data on the burden, severity and seasonality;
To characterise (phenotypically and genotypically) pathogens contributing to respiratory diseases and meningitis in order to understand strain relatedness (molecular epidemiology) and guide vaccine development, treatment and prevention policy;
To monitor trends in antiviral and antibacterial drug resistance in respiratory and meningeal pathogens in order to inform empiric treatment guidelines;
To monitor the impact and effectiveness of interventions to reduce respiratory diseases and meningitis;
To provide reference laboratory functions for specialised organism characterisation and identification related to respiratory communicable diseases and pathogens causing meningitis nationally and regionally;

To identify and characterise novel respiratory and meningeal pathogens with potential to cause outbreaks and to assist with response to respiratory disease outbreaks;
To be a source of local and regional expertise on respiratory diseases and meningitis;
To engage in directed and relevant research to answer questions related to regional communicable respiratory disease and meningitis disease problems and their surveillance and management; and
To build local and regional capacity in epidemiology and laboratory diagnostics for respiratory disease and meningitis.

Leadership

The Leaders of CRDM

CHERYL COHEN

Head of Centre
Cheryl Cohen is an Associate Professor in epidemiology at the University of the Witwatersrand and head of the Centre for Respiratory Diseases and Meningitis. She qualified as a medical doctor at the University of the Witwatersrand and is a Fellow of the College of Pathologists of South Africa in the discipline of Microbiology.

SIBONGILE WALAZA

Section Lead: Epidemiology
Dr Sibongile Walaza is a medical doctor with a MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics and a PhD in Public Health from the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. She is the Epidemiology section lead for the Centre for Respiratory Disease and Meningitis at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) in South Africa.

ANNE VON GOTTBERG

Section Lead: Laboraory
Dr Anne von Gottberg is currently the laboratory lead for the Centre for Respiratory Diseases and Meningitis at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, Johannesburg, South Africa and Associate Professor within the School of Pathology, Faculty of the Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg; and Honorary Professor, Department of Pathology, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, Cape Town.

Projects

What we've been busy with

COVID-19 Household Transmission Study (HTS)

Healthcare Utilisation and Seroprevalence Survey (HUTS)

PHIRST

PHIRST-C

COVID-19 Shedding Study

SAPPHGenE

Modeling multi-pathogen serosurveillance data for public health impact