On October 2, the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC/CAR) has delivered $8,356 worth of laboratory supplies to the Tajikistan’s State Scientific Research Institute of Preventive Medicine. The donated supplies will be used to conduct tests for COVID-19.
This latest donation is part of the $1.69 million worth of support pledged by CDC to support Tajikistan in combating the COVID-19 epidemic. That amount is in turn just a proportion of all the support provided to Tajikistan by different U.S. government agencies.
“We support the governments in four countries of Central Asia by providing technical expertise, training public health specialists, and procuring necessary equipment and supplies,” said CDC Central Asia Director Dr. Daniel Singer. “Our current COVID-19-related work builds on CDC’s long-standing contributions to control HIV and TB and prepare for influenza and other pandemic diseases in the region.”
CDC Central Asia has been supporting the ministries of health in Central Asia since the beginning of the outbreak by organizing trainings and providing technical assistance on emergency operations, laboratory operations, infection prevention and control, screening at ports of entry, risk communication and community engagement, and disease surveillance. CDC is also translating technical guidance documents published by leading international public health organizations into Russian for distribution.
This year CDC/Central Asia is celebrating its 25th anniversary. The first CDC office in the region was opened in 1995 in Almaty. Today, the agency has staff stationed in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan supporting those countries’ ministries of health to train health workers, strengthen their health systems, and respond to COVID-19, HIV, tuberculosis, and other infectious disease epidemics.
