GISAID Initiative is widely credited for successfully enabling the rapid sharing of influenza virus data through a unique sharing mechanism , that was recognized for its importance to global health by all G20 health ministers in 2017 . The Initiative involves public – private partnerships between the nonprofit organization Freunde von GISAID e.V. and governments of the Federal Republic of Germany , the official host of the GISAID EpiFlu ™ database , providing public access to the most complete collection of genetic sequence data of influenza viruses and related clinical and epidemiological data , Singapore and the United States of America . Initially spurred by the global threat posed by human infections with highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 , GISAID introduced its novel sharing mechanism in 2008 that permits free and open access to influenza data , to anyone who positively identifies himself or herself , and agrees to respect the inherent rights of contributors . GISAID ’s database access agreement ensures that contributors of virus sequence data do not forfeit intellectual property rights to the data
G20
2017 G20 Hamburg summit
GISAID