TICKRISK: Tackling Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever in Europe

By Katharine Worley, Project Manager - GO 

The ANRS-funded TICKRISK project is to co-develop preparedness, health education, and risk communication for CCHF outbreaks in 4 sites (France, Spain, Romania, and Türkiye) situated on Europe’s borderlands with different risk levels. The project evaluates the production of CCHFv scientific knowledge, its translation into public health policy, and local experiences of human-tick-animal-environmental (and where relevant, CCHF viral) interactions. CCHF is a tickborne virus.

TICKRISK brings together teams from Institut Pasteur, the University of Bordeaux, Inserm, IRD, INRAE, ENS Lyon, and IFEA Istanbul.  

Coordinated by Tamara Giles-Vernick (IP), TICKRISK runs until 2028. The project mobilizes social sciences expertise to improve communication on the risks of CCHF and develop appropriate health communication tools to prepare for and prevent epidemics.

TICKRISK annual meeting 2026

In June, TICKRISK held its annual meeting at Institut Pasteur. The teams presented their results from two years of ethnographic fieldwork and archival research and discussed possible interventions. Partners in Türkiye presented their findings about current explanations of CCHF emergence and risk, situating this local knowledge in a longer-term history of public health education. The work in Romania found that relying on climate change as an explanation for increasing populations of tick vectors and animal infections obscures important political economic factors, including Romania’s place in domesticated movements and a global trade in farmed animals. In Spain, researchers found that rural health structures lack resources and guidance for handling suspected cases of CCHF. Finally, in France where no human cases of CCHF have been diagnosed, the team found limited knowledge of CCHF among diverse social and occupational groups, although animal producers and hunters (highly exposed to potentially-infected ticks and animals) are aware of the disease but prioritize other health risks and the challenges of climate change. All teams concurred that surveillance of CCHF in these four countries operates according to reactive, rather than preventative logics.

The consortium addressed plans for the development of health education and risk communications. The Scientific Advisory Board provided feedback for future steps. Going forward, the project will organise local workshops, produce publications, and continue to develop its interventions in partner countries.