10 years after the genome, Africa finally to reap benefits of genetics

The genetic roots of African diseases are to be investigated in a £25 million initiative to bring the medical benefits of the human genome to the poorest continent.
The Human Heredity and Health in Africa project, or H3 Africa, will fund African scientists to research how genetic factors contribute to infectious diseases such as HIV/Aids, malaria and tuberculosis, which are the continent’s leading causes of death and ill health. It will also support research into non-communicable conditions such as diabetes, heart disease and cancer.
The programme, launched as scientists celebrate the tenth anniversary of the sequencing of the human genome this week, aims to redress concerns that Africa has missed out on the exciting medical research made possible since.
It is funded by two organisations that made the biggest financial contributions to the original Human Genome Project: the US National Institutes of Health and the Wellcome Trust, the British biomedical research charity.
“Africa has, for the most part, been left out of the boom in genomic science. We have not equally applied the tools of genomics to African disease and we are attempting to rectify that,” said Charles Rotimi, a Nigerian-born scientist at the US National Human Genome Research Institute, a leader of H3 Africa.
In the decade since the genome was sequenced scientists have used it to identify hundreds of genetic variations linked to human disease. Most of these studies, however, have involved European or Asian populations.
H3 Africa will support dozens of studies of the continent’s diseases, exploring how individual DNA variations influence susceptibility. It will also underpin genetic research into African pathogens and the vectors that carry themsuch as the malarial mosquito. The initiative aims to change the colonial approach to medical research in Africa and to increase the continent’s capacity to investigate its health problems for itself.
Bongani Mayosi, of the University of Cape Town in South Africa, who leads H3 Africa’s non-communicable disease steering group, said: “It indicates a very important shift in the way science is done in Africa. Up to nowwe have operated in almost a colonial mode of science. People outside Africa came here to collect samples, but studied them outside Africa to promote the knowledge and careers of people outside Africa. This is promoting science in Africa, by Africans and for Africans.”
As African populations are older and more genetically diverse than those from other continents, some insights from African genomes will be relevant to the health of other ethnicities.
Francis Collins, a leader of the Human Genome Project who is now director of the NIH, said: “Africa is a special place to carry out those kinds of studies. There is more genetic variation in Africa than anywhere; it is the cradle of humanity. Things that we learn in Africa will undoubtedly have broad implications for people in all areas of the planet.”