Funded Projects

During the COVID-19 pandemic, POPCORN was created to bring together investigators from all of Canada’s pediatric hospitals (16) and pediatric networks, and to establish a multidisciplinary approach to pediatric research. Despite the outstanding work accomplished by this “network of networks,” several gaps remain in Canada’s ability to respond effectively to a future pandemic, including:

1. the inability to rapidly conduct clinical trials in children and pregnant people;
2. the lack of real-time data to inform evidence-based policy decisions;
3. the inability to capture the full trajectory of a child’s illness.

With this proposal, our goal is to build on this unique research structure, now referred to as POPCORN 2.0, to rapidly identify and comprehensively study emerging infectious diseases in children and pregnant people, while maximizing the capacity and readiness to include them in clinical trials.

To achieve this, POPCORN 2.0 will:
i) collect and bank residual serum and respiratory samples from children and pregnant people across Canada;
ii) link data warehouses across all sites to enable syndromic surveillance and long-term outcomes assessment;
iii) streamline contracting, ethics review processes, and data and material transfer agreements to expedite clinical studies and trials.

Through these activities, POPCORN 2.0 will become the primary national maternal and child health resource for disease surveillance and pandemic preparedness, supported by harmonized clinical databases and the world’s largest pediatric biobank, serving both researchers and decision-makers.

The network will also function as a one-stop shop for private and academic partners, simplifying and accelerating the conduct of clinical studies and interventional trials. As such, POPCORN 2.0 represents an invaluable resource for Canada’s Biomanufacturing and Life Sciences Strategy and ECaPPH’s vision, by significantly strengthening infectious disease discovery and surveillance capabilities and accelerating the translation of research into the delivery of life-saving therapies and vaccines for some of Canada’s most vulnerable populations.