​A new European-African collaboration to improve the way infections in newborns are treated was launched recently. The project, SNIP-AFRICA, aims to reduce mortality among neonates in hospital with sepsis in Africa, in an era of increasing antimicrobial resistance.

Funded by the European Union under the Global Health EDCTP3 Programme, SNIP-AFRICA will conduct an adaptive trial to identify the best drug regimens and doses for difficult-to-treat infections and sepsis, which threaten the lives of newborns in neonatal units in sub-Saharan African countries.

Stellenbosch University (SU) will be involved in the majority of work packages. Professors Adrie Bekker and Eric Decloedt will be leading the working group aimed at accelerating African neonatal sepsis pharmacokinetic (how the antibiotic moves through and out of the body of the neonate) trials to optimise antimicrobial treatment for neonates. SU will also be facilitating African capacity building within the SNIP-AFRICA consortium to perform analytical quantification of antimicrobial plasma concentrations as well as training in pharmacometric modeling (using the measured neonatal drug levels to develop a combined mathematical and statistical model able to predict appropriate neonatal dosing) of these plasma concentrations to optimise dosing.

The SU research team involved, will benefit from R20 million funding.​

• Read the international statement here . ​