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The 1st online free refresher vaccinology course for health care specialists already trained in vaccinology.

SAVE THE DATES!!

The next edition of ARVAC, the free online Alumni Refresher Vaccinology Course will be held twice on:

  • Tuesday 2 to Thursday 4 September 2025, from 10 am to 12:20 PM (CET, Geneva Time) for the "Morning Session"

And

  • Monday 8 to Wednesday 10 September 2025, from 3 PM eto 5:20 PM (CET, Geneva Time) for the "Afternoon Session"

The draft Programme 2025 is available below on this page.

Registration will open soon. Stay tuned!

Context

ICAVT is a partnership of more than 30 vaccinology courses worldwide. Those trainings have a different history, background, content and audiences but they all have trained, over the years, altogether, thousands of experts in the area of vaccinology.

However, alumni from those various trainings have constantly requested to attend again the trainings they attended initially or other ones to update their knowledge as the vaccinology area is in constant evolution and changes thanks to a strong research pipeline and a rich and diverse implementation community.

Instead of allowing alumni to attend the trainings they already completed again or attend another course and therefore reduce the number of new experts trained, ICAVT members have agreed to jointly develop a single common refresher course dedicated to their alumni. This course provides annually the alumni from various background with lectures on the last updates on immunization and on new topics key for their daily activities.

Course objectives

The course aims at providing a refresher course and latest updates on immunization and vaccines to the alumni of the various existing advanced vaccinology training courses worldwide.

The alumni refresher vaccinology course will provide updates in the following key areas of vaccinology: immunology, vaccine development, clinical trials, regulatory processes, vaccine-specific issues including new vaccines, vaccination strategies and policies, programme implementation, humanitarian emergencies, social, economic, political and ethical issues, financing, and communications. It will also provide lectures on new areas of the discipline uncovered by previous courses.

Who can attend?

This new course is targeting health care experts which have already been trained in one of the ICAVT vaccinology courses (Alumni). If you haven't been trained yet in vaccinology, we advise you to visit the ICAVT Vaccinology Trainings catalogue to identify courses you can apply to.

Format

The exact same online course is offered twice to allow participants for all over the world to attend (Morning + Afternoon sessions scheduled on 2 different weeks):

  • Each week, 3 half-day sessions (3-4 hours each) are offered.
  • Each session of 3-4 hours contains 3 to 4 lectures of 35 minutes each.
  • Each lecture consists in a 25-minutes lecture and a 10 minutes live discussion between the attendants and the lecturer, animated by the chair of the session (an ICAVT member)
  • Alumni and ICAVT partners can ask questions using the Chat. 

Accreditation

Every year, the course programme is submitted to the European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (EACCME®). Last year in June 2024, ARVAC has been accredited with 5.5 credits (Event reference LEE/2024/00621 for Week 1: 4-6 June 2024 and LEE/2024/00622 for Week 2: 11-13 June 2024). The course organizer (ADVAC at the University of Geneva) checks the attendance during the course to be able to deliver the Continuing Medical Education (CME) credits adequately.  Participants in the Course should be able to convert these credits through their respective professional bodies. 


Scientific Committee  


DRAFT PROGRAMME ARVAC 2025

MORNING WEEK: 2-4 SEPTEMBER 2025

TUESDAY 2 SEPTEMBER 2025
Chair - TBC
Lecture 1: Updates on RSV (including adults) and GBS vaccines
Lecture 2: Updates on Enteropathogens vaccines (Rota, Noro, ETEC, Shigella…)
Lecture 3: Updates on PCV
WEDNESDAY 3 SEPTEMBER 2025
Chair - TBC
Lecture 4: Artificial Intelligence in the Vaccinology Development
Lecture 5: Developing Vaccines for outbreaks (including pandemics)
Lecture 6: Climate Change and vaccines (through the example of arboviruses?)
Panel 1: What’s new on the vaccine policy and country support front?
THURSDAY 4 SEPTEMBER 2025
Chair - TBC
Panel 2: Financial support to countries? (consequences of Aid cuts on immunization coverage, mortality and VPDs) 
Lecture 7: Prioritization and Optimization of the immunization schedule
Lecture 8: Vaccine market, market shaping and regional initiatives for vaccine production
Lecture 9: Human Challenge Trials

 AFTERNOON WEEK: 8-10 SEPTEMBER 2025

MONDAY 8 SEPTEMBER 2025
Chair - TBC
Lecture 1: Updates on RSV (including adults) and GBS vaccines
Lecture 2: Updates on Enteropathogens vaccines (Rota, Noro, ETEC, Shigella…)
Lecture 3: Updates on PCV
TUESDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2025
Chair - TBC
Lecture 4: Artificial Intelligence in the Vaccinology Development
Lecture 5: Developing Vaccines for outbreaks (including pandemics)
Lecture 6: Climate Change and vaccines (through the example of arboviruses?)
Panel 1: What’s new on the vaccine policy and country support front?
WEDNESDAY 10 SEPTEMBER 2025
Chair - TBC
Panel 2: Financial support to countries? (consequences of Aid cuts on immunization coverage, mortality and VPDs) 
Lecture 7: Prioritization and Optimization of the immunization schedule
Lecture 8: Vaccine market, market shaping and regional initiatives for vaccine production
Lecture 9: Human Challenge Trials

 

Lecturers & Panelists 2025 (TBC)

  • Declarations of interest 
  • Biographies    
Chairs 2025 (TBC)
  • Declarations of interest 
  • Biographies   

 

Archives : ARVAC 2024 PROGRAMME

RESOURCES MORNING WEEK: 4-6 JUNE 2024

TUESDAY 4 JUNE 2024
Chair -  Kamel Senouci (University of Geneva)
Lecture 1: Updates on Meningitis Vaccines  - Marie-Pierre Preziosi (WHO)  Presentation     Video
Lecture 2: Updates on NITAGs - Benjamin Kagina (University of Cape Town) Presentation     Video
Lecture 3: Challenges of adult immunization - Pierre Van Damme (university of Antwerp) Presentation     Video
WEDNESDAY 5 JUNE 2024
Chair: Ombeva Malande (East Africa Centre for Vaccines and Immunization, ECAVI) 
Lecture 4: Reaching zero-dose children - Ranjana Kumar (Gavi) Presentation     Video
Lecture 5: Vaccines and AMR - Mateusz Hasso-Agopsowicz (WHO) Presentation     Video
Lecture 6: New clinical/regulatory framework: acceleration of vaccine licensure - Jakob Cramer (CEPI) Presentation     Video
Panel 1: What’s new on the vaccine policy and country support front? - Marta Tufet Bayona (GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance), Presentation     Video Joachim Hombach (WHO)  Presentation     Video
THURSDAY 6 JUNE 2024
Chair - Naveen Thacker (International Paediatric Association)
Panel 2: Update on vaccines confidence - Naveen Thacker (International Paediatric Association),  Angus Thomson (Irimi) Presentation    ICONE Video Video
Lecture 7: Maternal Immunization - Clare Cutland (University of the Witwatersrand) Presentation    ICONE Video Video
Lecture 8: Lower-efficacy vaccines: what is acceptable and how to integrate more public health interventions and vaccines (e.g Malaria vaccine) - Hanna Nohynek (Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare) Presentation    ICONE Video Video
Lecture 9: Updates on Dengue and Chikungunya vaccines - Anna Durbin (Johns Hopkins University) Presentation    ICONE Video Video

RESOURCES AFTERNOON WEEK: 11-13 JUNE 2024

TUESDAY 11 JUNE 2024
Chair - Clare Cutland (ALIVE, University of the Witwatersrand)
Lecture 1: Updates on Meningitis Vaccines  - Marie-Pierre Preziosi (WHO) Presentation     Video
Lecture 9: Updates on Dengue and Chikungunya vaccines - Anna Durbin (Johns Hopkins University)Presentation     Video
Lecture 3: Challenges of the adult immunization - Pierre Van Damme (university of Antwerp) Presentation     Video
WEDNESDAY 12 JUNE 2024
Chair - Rodolfo Villena (University of Chile)
Panel 1: What’s new on the vaccine policy and support front? - Aurelia Nguyen (GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance) Presentation     Video, Christoph Steffen (WHO) Presentation     Video
Lecture 4: Vaccines and AMR - Mateusz Hasso-Agopsowicz (WHO) Presentation     Video
Lecture 5: New clinical/regulatory framework: acceleration of vaccine licensure - Jakob Cramer (CEPI) Presentation     Video
 Lecture 6: Reaching zero-dose children - Chris Wolff (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation) Presentation     Video
Doc : Questions to Aurelia Nguyen And Christoph Steffen unanswered during the course
THURSDAY 13 JUNE 2024
Chair  : Denise Naniche (ISGlobal, Spain)
Panel 2: Update on vaccines confidence - Naveen Thacker (International Paediatric Association) Steve Lewandowsky (Bristol University) Presentation     Video
Lecture 7: Maternal Immunization - Clare Cutland (University of the Witwatersrand) Presentation     Video
Lecture 8: Lower-efficacy vaccines: what is acceptable and how to integrate more public health interventions and vaccines (e.g Malaria vaccine) - Hanna Nohynek (Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare) Presentation     Video
Lecture 2: Updates on NITAGs - Benjamin Kagina (University of Cape Town) Presentation     Video