ECRAID-Base Kicks Off
On March 1st ECRAID (the European Clinical Research Alliance for Infectious Diseases)-Base was officially launched, followed by a virtual kickoff meeting that same week where the scientific plans and the management aspects of ECRAID-Base were presented.
During the virtual meeting the vision and purpose of ECRAID-Base were presented, as well as the strategic agenda and the steps towards ECRAID becoming an independent not-for-profit legal entity in 2021. Marc Bonten – ECRAID Co-coordinator – opened the meeting by giving insights on the key objectives of the project and the next steps. ECRAID-Base’s contribution to the European Commission (EC)’s infectious diseases policy activities was also illustrated by Arjon van Hengel, Director General of the EC Research and Innovation.

“Working from home, we had our share of technical glitches and issues, nonetheless the Kickoff meeting turned out to be a success and well received by our long term partners. It is a privilege for me to be part of the management the ECRAID-Base project which acts as a stepping-stone for the European Clinical Research Alliance on Infectious Diseases (ECRAID) network.”
Ram finds that good project management is necessary to ensure:
- Efficiency in collaborating: understand who does what, where are the interdependencies, what are the expectations;
- Communicate on issues, delays, questions: avoid misunderstanding;
- Achieving the set objectives, milestones and deliverables without any delays and within the budget of the project.
ECRAID-Base
ECRAID-Base is the core set of activities for ECRAID, which aspires to become the first of its kind, pan-European clinical research network for infectious diseases in Europe. Over the five-year duration of ECRAID-Base, ECRAID will evolve into a self-sustaining, not-for-profit organization conducting clinical research.
ECRAID-Base is the unification of several networks into one central sustainable infrastructure. The networks built by COMBACTE and PREPARE will allow running clinical research faster, easier, and more cost-effective.
“Having the infrastructure from the networks built in COMBACTE and PREPARE put us in a privileged position back in 2018. Another advantage was the governments’ recognition of the relevance of the antimicrobial resistance (AMR) issue” – Marc Bonten, COMBACTE Program Coordinator & ECRAID-Plan co-Coordinator
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