ASEAN-Australia Health Security Fellowship Program

What does this project mean for future pandemics?

  • Training people to rapidly detect, assess, report and respond to infectious disease threats is essential for Australia’s health security and is also needed to meet our international obligations under International Health Regulations (2005).
  • Globally, this type of training is achieved through Field Epidemiology Training Programs (FETP). The Australian FETP is the Master of Philosophy in Applied Epidemiology (MAE) program at the National Centre for Epidemiology & Population Health within Australian National University (ANU).
  • The ASEAN-Australia Health Security Fellowship Program provides scholarships for talented people to train in the MAE – nine scholarships are for people from Southeast Asian (ASEAN) countries and up to eight are for Australians. The program will also support field epidemiology training in ASEAN countries.

Project details

Through the Fellowship Program, professionals from ASEAN countries will have the opportunity to gain a highly relevant qualification that can then be used to strengthen health security in the region and build people-to-people and institutional links with Australia.

The aims of the ASEAN-Australia Health Security Fellowship Program are to:

  • strengthen human capacity in the region to fight emerging infectious diseases through increasing the pool of highly qualified epidemiologists.
  • support the ASEAN-Australia Plan of Action to implement the Strategic Partnership 2015–2019, notably by strengthening collaboration in research and development on health issues identified as priorities by ASEAN countries and Australia.

To achieve these aims, the program will:

  • give nine postgraduate scholarships to outstanding candidates from ASEAN countries – they will undertake a two-year research degree in Applied Epidemiology (the MAE) at the Australian National University
  • give up to eight postgraduate scholarships to outstanding Australian candidates to support the two-year research degree in Applied Epidemiology (the MAE) at the Australian National University – the scholarships support field placement of either one or two years in an ASEAN country
  • support field epidemiology training for a broader health security workforce in ASEAN countries, delivered by the applied epidemiology scholars under the supervision of MAE Program staff.

The ASEAN-Australia Health Security Fellowship Program is funded by the Indo-Pacific Centre for Health Security, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and implemented by the MAE Program team.

Read more about the Master of Philosophy in Applied Epidemiology (MAE) program at the National Centre for Epidemiology & Population Health, Australian National University (ANU).

Related Research Areas

  • Public health research
  • Key populations

Related Cross-cutting Themes

  • Partnerships, collaboration and translation