Saudi Gazette report

RIYADH — The Mission of the World Health Organization (WHO) in Saudi Arabia announced that the Public Health Authority’s (Weqaya) laboratory has met the organization’s requirements to recommend recognizing it as a national influenza center in the Kingdom.

“The laboratory has a critical role in monitoring and supporting public health information for rapid detection and control of infectious diseases, investigation of disease outbreaks and scientific analysis of known, new and emerging diseases,” it said in a statement.

According to the WHO Mission, the laboratory, which was designated by the Ministry of Health as a national laboratory for influenza in 2017, has expanded its services to test influenza and other respiratory viruses to participate in the new integrated surveillance program in the Kingdom.

“The laboratory worked with the coronavirus laboratory, which has been a reference laboratory at the time of the pandemic to examine cases of infection, in addition to the Genome Laboratory, which includes a very wide range of platforms and advanced technologies for genome sequencing.

“Such laboratories provide programs and tasks such as the national polio laboratory accredited by WHO to support global activities to eradicate the disease, and the laboratory for vaccine-preventable diseases with reference diagnosis and surveillance for measles, mumps and rubella,” the mission added.

It is noteworthy that the national influenza centers (NICs) are institutions responsible for the laboratory surveillance of influenza. They are designated by national ministries of health and formally recognized by WHO to serve as the backbone of the WHO’s Global Influenza Surveillance and Response System (GISRS).

NCIs collect virus specimens in their country and perform preliminary analysis. They ship representative clinical specimens and isolated viruses to WHO for advanced antigenic and genetic analysis. The results form the basis for WHO recommendations on the composition of influenza vaccine each year, as well as relevant risk assessment activities of WHO.