November 2025, Stellenbosch, South Africa – At the International Society for Vaccines (ISV) 2025 Congress, held for the first time on African soil on October 28–30 in Stellenbosch, the innovative Background Rates of Adverse events for Vaccine Evaluation (BRAVE) project, a Global Vaccine Data Network (GVDN)-led, CEPI-funded initiative reshaping how vaccine safety is monitored across Africa, was spotlighted.
The ISV Congress, a premier global convening of vaccine experts from academia, industry, and public health, provided an ideal platform to showcase African-led innovation in vaccinology. Through projects like the BRAVE Project, the continent is not just participating in vaccine science, it is leading it.
Closing the Gaps in Vaccine Safety
In many low- and middle-income countries, vaccine safety systems still rely on passive reporting, often resulting in incomplete data and under-reporting of rare adverse events. The BRAVE project is addressing this challenge head-on.
By generating background incidence rates for selected adverse events of special interest (AESIs), BRAVE project provides the essential context needed to interpret post-vaccine events. This data-driven approach allows faster evidence-based safety assessments, helping build public trust, inform policy, and combat misinformation about vaccines.
Spanning Ghana, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Kenya, the BRAVE project combines retrospective and prospective hospital data with health and demographic surveillance systems (HDSS). It also pioneers geocoding and catchment modelling methods that can support rapid outbreak response and strengthen local research capacity.
“The BRAVE project is giving countries the tools and skills to collect and assimilate high-quality, real-world data that are needed to evaluate vaccine safety in real time,” said Associate- Prof. Clare Cutland, BRAVE project’s Africa Coordinating Centre Lead, Wits African Leadership in Vaccinology Expertise (Wits-Alive), University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. “It’s about ensuring that vaccine confidence is built on solid evidence, and that evidence is being generated in Africa by Africans.”
“By linking data networks across continents, we’re creating a shared scientific infrastructure for vaccine safety,” added Prof Steven Black, GVDN Co-Director. “The future of global immunisation depends on local data, and the BRAVE project is showing how to deliver it.”
The project aligns with the GVDN’s mission to establish a global infrastructure for vaccine safety science, empowering LMICs to detect, interpret, and respond to safety signals during vaccine rollouts for emerging pathogens such as Nipah, Lassa fever, Rift Valley Fever, and Mpox.
“Hosting ISV 2025 in Africa is symbolic, it underscores the region’s growing leadership in vaccine research and safety,” said Prof Ed Rybicki, Congress Co-Chair. “Projects like the BRAVE project demonstrate how African science is shaping global health security.”
A Call to Collaborate
The BRAVE project reflects a new era in African vaccinology, one where data, collaboration, and confidence drive vaccine equity. GVDN invites research institutions, funders, and public-health partners to join in strengthening this global network for vaccine safety. Together, we can ensure that every dose given anywhere in the world is supported by evidence from everywhere.
To learn more about the BRAVE project and GVDN, visit https://www.globalvaccinedatanetwork.org/ or follow @GVDN on LinkedIn.