ANSES and Institut Pasteur: a partnership at the service of One Health
Institut Pasteur and ANSES have just signed a partnership agreement to pool their skills in the interests of ‘One Health’. The two organisations carry out complementary activities: one studies human infectious diseases and the other the risks associated with animal diseases and food, including diseases transmitted from animals to humans and by vectors.
The five-year partnership agreement was signed on 24 May 2024 by Benoît Vallet, Director General of ANSES, and Yasmine Belkaid, President of Institut Pasteur. It formalises and structures the long-standing collaboration between the two organisations. Among other initiatives, they have been jointly involved in large-scale research projects such as the One Health European Joint Programme (EJP), the EMERGEN consortium for surveillance and research into infections caused by emerging pathogens, using microbial genomics, and the Laboratory of Excellence in Integrative Biology of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IBEID).
The two partners regularly cooperate through their respective reference mandates on common pathogens such as Listeria, Salmonella, and the toxin that causes botulism. These mandates aim to coordinate surveillance, the detection of abnormal situations, and the investigation of outbreaks, as well as the production of expert appraisals on these pathogens, in human health for Institut Pasteur and in animal health and food for ANSES. The strengthening of collaborative work between the reference centres hosted by Institut Pasteur and ANSES’s French and European reference laboratories will include exchanges of practices, data, and biological material.
Both organisations are also part of the Biotox-Piratox-Piratome national network of laboratories. This network has the expertise and capacity to provide the authorities with the assessment data required to make decisions in the event of a suspected nuclear, radiological, biological or chemical malicious or terrorist attack. In particular, ANSES’s laboratories may be called upon to investigate biological threats to environmental, food or veterinary samples, in parallel with or in support of Institut Pasteur’s Laboratory for Urgent Response to Biological Threats.
Lastly, the partnership between Institut Pasteur and ANSES will promote joint research into infectious diseases, focusing for example on diseases transmissible between animals and humans, food microbiology, antimicrobial resistance, diseases transmitted by vectors such as mosquitoes or ticks, and epidemiology. This collaboration may involve taking part in joint research projects, co-funding theses, or hosting staff from the other partner institution. The teams will also enjoy privileged access to each organisation's technology platforms.