As an inter-institutional network, SACIDS focuses on both individual and institutional development. This is in order to strengthen primarily SACD’s and thereby Africa’s capacity for addressing the infectious disease burden to society. And it does so by:
- Enhancing the collaboration between the human and animal health sectors into a common cause embodying One Health in the fight against infectious diseases, an increasingly shared problem, bearing in mind that the majority of infectious diseases of humans originate from animals;
- Utilising the network-wide institutional resources, equipment and biosafety levels which gives the SADC region the capacity to be able to handle safely even the most dangerous infectious diseases known, such as Ebola, and therefore ability to diagnose such infections within the region;
- Linking Southern Africa’s institutions with those in the industrialized world as well as those in other developing region in an alliance for studying infectious diseases in the endemic settings of Africa;
- Developing and delivering targeted and internationally competitive continuing professional development programme courses and special MSc programmes in such specialized disciplines as Molecular Biology and Analytical Epidemiology;
- Offering research leadership career development apprenticeships in theme based Postdoctoral and PhD programmes
- Engaging an international panel of specialists from Southern Africa and the Smart Partner Institutions in course development, selection of the most promising young scientists and in co-supervision of research apprentices
- Developing a common consortium knowledge base and shared data/information
- Having a Secretariat and Virtual Graduate School that coordinated and monitors capacity development activities of the SACIDS consortium