Representatives from the Health Commission of Anhui Province and the University of Science and Technology of China attend the signing ceremony on Feb 18 to build a public health laboratory. [Photo/WeChat account: hefeigaoxinfabu]

The Health Commission of Anhui Province and the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) signed an agreement on Feb 18 to build a public health laboratory in Hefei, capital of Anhui.

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) of the province and the life science and medicine department of USTC will work together to build the laboratory, which will improve the province's ability to deal with emergencies such as epidemics, according to Vice Governor of Anhui Deng Xiangyang's speech at the signing ceremony.

Deng said the provincial government will provide the resources needed to meet the laboratory's data and biomedical research requirements.

USTC will organize scientific research projects to be carried out at the laboratory and train researchers.

A management committee and an expert committee will be set up by the two sides.

We hope to build the laboratory into a globally influential research institute for public health, Deng said.

Wang Yu, the former director of the national CDC, attended the ceremony and said provincial government-university cooperation will be further promoted as a means of pushing forward sci-tech research and helping containing the novel coronavirus.

Institutions of medical care and disease control, universities, scientific institutes and enterprises are encouraged to develop science and technology to address urgent needs in preventing and curing diseases, Wang said.

The laboratory will receive support so that it can cooperate with medical institutions and scientific research institutes in Anhui.

The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC (Anhui Provincial Hospital) is a designated hospital in Anhui province for people infected with the novel coronavirus. USTC ranked fourth in the Times Higher Education's Emerging Economies University Rankings 2020.