The Committee For Health Risk Monitoring and Anticipation (COVARS) is a new body charged with providing information to French public officials to guide their decisions concerning the anticipation, prevention and human consequences of health crises (scientific monitoring, prediction and modeling, risk reduction recommendations, population management and accompaniment, etc.). 

COVARS takes the place of and builds upon the COVID-19 Scientific Counsel and the Vaccinal Strategy Orientation Committee created during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

COVARS became active in September 2022 and its missions concern all infectious diseases constituting a potential public health risk. The Committee will have a particular focus on zoonotic infections, i.e., diseases transmitted from animals to humans. COVARS' missions will function within the One Health approach, which integrates health risks resulting from not only human and animal infectious agents but also environmental pollutants, nutritional factors and climate change.

Roger Le Grand, director of CEA-Jacob's IDMIT division, is one of the 18 members of COVARS, this latter headed by Professor of Immunology Brigitte Autran.

"The scientific committee comprises specialists in the One Health approach to enable a better understanding of the links between human, animal, and ecosystem health," explains Roger Le Grand. "Its experts come from highly varied but complementary disciplines and are able to address the full range of issues raised by the emergence of health crises."

COVARS thus benefits from experts in epidemiology, infectious diseases, virology, veterinary medicine and entomology who work with specialists in vaccines, patient management and social sciences, as well as with a citizen representative and two patient-association representatives.