Kenya to host Eastern Africa CDC hub, agreed at World Health Summit in Nairobi

Kenya and the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention signed a framework agreement on April 27 to establish the Eastern Africa Regional Coordinating Centre in Nairobi. (capitalfm.co.ke) (kbc.co.ke) The agreement was announced as the World Health Summit Regional Meeting opened in Nairobi, where the 2026 gathering runs from April 27 to 29 at the United Nations Office at Nairobi. (afro.who.int) (health.go.ke) Africa CDC says its Eastern Africa Regional Coordination Centre supports 14 member states: Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. (africacdc.org) Regional coordinating centres are Africa CDC’s field hubs. The Eastern Africa office is tasked with surveillance, laboratory systems, public health communications and support for outbreak response across the region. (africacdc.org) The Nairobi deal builds on earlier steps. Kenya’s health ministry said in April 2024 that it had approved 10 acres of land and $2 million for the centre. (health.go.ke) By September 2025, Kenya and Africa CDC said they were moving to finalize a memorandum of understanding, a joint workplan and an operational framework for the partnership. (africacdc.org) Those 2025 talks also tied the hub to specific preparedness work, including a Public Health Emergency Operations Centre, regional simulation exercises, surveillance integration and expansion of Kenya’s laboratory network into a regional reference system. (africacdc.org) Africa CDC has been framing this year’s summit around shrinking external development assistance and wider financing gaps in African health systems. Kenya’s bid to anchor the eastern hub fits that push for more regionally financed and regionally run health security capacity. (africacdc.org) Kenya’s health ministry has separately described Nairobi as host to both the Africa CDC Eastern Africa centre and the World Health Organization’s regional emergency hub, part of a broader effort to make the city a public-health coordination base. (health.go.ke 1) (health.go.ke 2) The new agreement does not create Eastern Africa cooperation from scratch. It gives a formal host-country framework to a regional centre that Africa CDC already lists in Nairobi and that Kenya has been funding and negotiating toward for at least two years. (africacdc.org) (health.go.ke)