The project “Social Innovation with New and Active Citizens” has for 24 months, worked towards strengthening and empowering young minorities, migrants, refugees and local youth in becoming active citizens with respect for democratic values, fundamental rights and intercultural understanding. The project has been implemented by Red Cross societies in Bulgaria, Denmark, Hungary and Romania.The background for this project was that all partners had witnessed an influx of refugees and migrants to their countries, while at the same time negative attitudes towards migrants and minorities were widespread in all countries and on the rise with populism spreading all over Europe. As a result, e.g. Roma communities are subject to considerable social and economic vulnerability partly due to discimination and exclusion. A needs assessment showed that the challenges for the target groups are common across the countries. Although Romania has received fewer migrants than the other countries and Denmark has a small Roma population, the stereotypes of minorities and migrants persist in all partner countries. Against this backdrop, the immediate objective of the project was that: Young minorities, migrants and local youth in Bulgaria, Denmark, Hungary and Romania have increased opportunity and strengthened capacity to support socially inclusive communities through participation in innovative volunteer driven activities. The main target groups have been minority populations such as Roma communities, migrants, refugees, young volunteers in the partner organizations, other civil society organizations as well as public authorities (ministries, municipalities). The general public has also been a target group for awareness raising and the project partners have worked closely with media to disseminate the information and activities that the project produced. The projected succeeded in engaging voulnteers to develop innovative volunteer driven activities, whereby the young volunteers empowered themselves through improved life skills, self-confidence and a sense of inclusion. The project activities were focused around two thematic pillars: Life skills and peer-to-peer dialogue.The project partners all succeeded in translating and adapting the Life skills manual developed by the Danish Red Cross Youth, to reflect each countries’ needs in close cooperation with youth volunteers, minorities and migrants. Bulgarian Red cross held a transnational training of trainers, during which experts from the Danish Red Cross Youth trained youth volunteers from Bulgaria, Denmark and Romania to become Life Skills Trainers. The main objective has been to establish a strong theoretical background for Life Skills and integrate this into the regional RC branches and existing training/workshop practices, which overall has been a success. The Life skills program has become completely youth-led and owned; the volunteers chose the groups they would like to work with, and, with the assistance of the project coordinators, changed and added to the existing materials according to the feedback of the participants. The participants in the Life skills activities are not seen as a “target group”, but as equal partners in the development and implementation of activities, and they are encouraged to improve the program based both on the local context and their own experiences as representatives of different minority and/or vulnerable groups. This has also led to widening the anticipated number of participants. There have been participants with disabilities, as well as young people from different other minorities besides Roma and migrants, such as participants with different ethnical background, sexual orientation and foster children, etc. Hence the project has resulted in increased opportunities for more groups. The peer-to-peer based community dialogue activities involved local youth, minorities, and migrants to come up with, develop and facilitate peer-to-peer dialogue on topics on discrimination, social inclusion and critical thinking. Hungarian Red Cross hosted a transnational training of trainers in peer-to-peer dialogue and the partners all developed innovative peer-to-peer activities, the common denominator being, to discuss, adjust and continuously refine the activities with the inclusion of minorities, migrants and local youth. The peer-to-peer activities have had impact at local, national and European level: At European level the project has established a transnational network of young motivated volunteers who are sharing knowledge, experiences, best practices and innovative methods in conducting social youth work. At the national level young volunteers have increased their capacities and gained knowledge on initiating dialogue and cooperating effectively with local authorities, media and other civil society organizations. Furthermore, the partners and other stakeholders have gained increased awareness about the situation of minorities and migrants.

Expert opinion from across the world recommends, & calls for, modular laboratory systems to be made available for disease monitoring missions. The WHO calls these, “Rapid Response Mobile Laboratories” (RRML). ONELAB will develop modular RRML for rapid, flexible, scalable, multi-scenario deployments into the widest range of possible settings. These next-generation facilities will support next-generation measurement-technologies/methodologies and, through satellite communications, form wide-area GIS enabled laboratory information systems. Thus, simultaneously providing point-of-need disease detection, along with high-level situational awareness. ONELAB will also develop advanced measurement systems for a staged disease detection response. Exploiting a panel of acute viral infection biomarkers enables early detection of disease during its asymptomatic incubation. Using this at the outbreak of disease, when much is still undefined, supports effective immediate & targeted public health interventions. Additionally, using proven methodologies developed in response to COVID 19, ONELAB will develop & demonstrate a workflow for semi-autonomous disease specific biomarker discovery. This application & delivery of agile science enhances the capability & capacity of current disease testing-strategies substantially RRMLs are only as good as the skilled teams who operate them. So, ONELAB builds world-wide networks & partnerships of experienced experts to: define contextually-aligned best practice; develop a consensus-driven concepts of operation; and, disseminate this though a pandemic testing playbook. We will develop capability & capacity with training & networking-events that continue beyond the project. Finally, community mass-testing requires engagement & acceptance from all citizens, which is why we will engage with the public, & produce a citizen’s guide to mass community testing, supported by educational outreach resources.