Emergency call for hantavirus or Ebola virus

Focus

Through this emergency grant, the Swedish Research Council intends to support projects that can quickly contribute to dealing with ongoing virus outbreaks that risk developing into a pandemic. The focus is on accelerating research with the aim of enabling rapid implementation in healthcare, public health work or necessary societal measures.

The grant will finance activities that are directly aimed at enabling rapid societal impact. This may concern, for example, the implementation of solutions with the potential to increase knowledge in pathogenesis, prevention, diagnostics, treatment, or contact tracing. Data-driven research and issues related to epidemiology and public health linked to the outbreak may also be relevant. Emphasis is placed on interventions that can have an effect within a short period of time and help to limit the spread of infection and reduce the burden of disease and societal impact. The supported research must generate reliable and implementable results within the time that the grant is available.

In the European partnership BE READY External link., areas have been identified in hantavirus where knowledge gaps exist:

• Animal reservoirs and environmental surveillance
  
• Human-to-human transmission and modelling
  
• Natural history and pathogenesis
  
• Development of tools and care
  
• Development of interventions while evaluating existing treatments
  
• Social response, communication, infodemic

Regarding Ebola, the WHO has decided to declare an international threat to human health. The WHO has developed a list of research priorities for the Ebola virus. External link.

The identified areas are suggestions for possible specialisations but do not exclude other important specialisations.

To stimulate collaboration and increased sharing of research results within the initiative, the Swedish Research Council may carry out a number of activities within the initiative, such as webinars, workshops or conferences. Researchers who are granted funding under the call are expected to participate in such activities.

Previous grant from the Swedish Research Council

To be eligible to apply under this call, you must be or have been the project leader for a previous grant from the Swedish Research Council. The last year of the grant period must be 2022 or later. Below is a list of the types of previous grants that are required as a basis for applying:

• Project grants (including project grants for international collaborations),
• one of our career grants (international postdoc, starting grant, consolidation grant, grant for a half-time position in a clinical environment, grant for research time),
• grant for research environment.

The grant can be awarded within any of the Swedish Research Council's areas, but must be relevant to the area of infection according to the information under "Focus" above.

Number of applications and previous grants

You can only submit one application for this grant under this call. There are no restrictions on which other grants can be applied for or held at the same time, as long as it does not relate to the same project.