This study will be performed by a consortium of inter-disciplinary African and European experts from Ghana, Ethiopia, Germany, Norway, and partners in India.

Partners of the ASPIRE consortium include three Ethiopian study sites at the (i) Jimma University Medical Centere (JUMC) in the Jimma, (ii) the St. Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College (SPHMMC) in Addis Ababa and (iii) the Teaching and Referral Hospital and College of Health Sciences of the ARSI University in Asella, as well as (iv) the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, Ghana.

Further, two institutes from Germany acting as partner and coordinating centers from the University of Düsseldorf (HHU) and the University of Munich (LMU) provide research and infrastructure support as well as project management. The Institute of Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine of University of Munich (LMU) is involved since many years in collaborative research activities with African partners. LMU is leading the ASPIRE study consortium in terms of financial and project management towards the EU funder.

Further, the University of Oslo (UiO) Norway, Ethiopia, and Ghana have been linked since 2017 within the COMBAT AMR network (combat-amr.org) which specifically focused on increasing capacities for microbiology diagnostics, surveillance, quality control, molecular drug resistance analysis, and antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) through hospital partnerships between university hospitals in Germany and tertiary care hospitals in several African countries.