Britain is investing £25 million to boost pandemic preparedness and halt outbreaks in Southeast Asia, a known hotspot for dangerous new pathogens.

The initiative, which announced its first grants this week, includes projects to bolster disease surveillance in remote communities, train specialist laboratory scientists, and run simulation exercises to stress-test the region’s ability to tackle emerging threats.

In an exclusive interview the Minister for the Indo-Pacific, Seema Malhotra, told the Telegraph that the portfolio is an “example of how we are investing smartly” to keep UK nationals safe – within Southeast Asia and beyond.

“Look, we have British nationals across the region, it’s a really important space for our growth, our prosperity, our security,” Ms Malhotra said during a trip to Bangkok. “But we also see that when pandemics start, they can spread very quickly – unless you’ve built the capacity to detect early, to respond very quickly, and to contain those outbreaks.

“We recognise that for public health in the UK, it really matters that we’ve got ways in which we’re looking at prevention… and we also know that Southeast Asia is becoming a global hotspot for the risk of new pandemics and new infections,” she said.

Rapid deforestation, massive urbanisation and a pervasive wildlife trade are pushing animals and humans into closer contact in the richly biodiverse region, where scientists estimate an average of 66,000 people are infected with zoonotic Sars-related coronaviruses each year.

Pathogens similar to Covid-19 have already been found in Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos – and earlier this month, a study in Cell journal identified a Covid-like virus with potential to infect humans in horseshoe bats some 200 miles from Thailand’s capital city. While there is no evidence this virus has jumped to people yet, experts said it’s a reminder of the risk.

“[This study] does not change the overall picture – rather, it strengthens the case that Southeast Asia is a region where Sars-related coronaviruses are circulating, mixing, and occasionally producing traits relevant to human infection,” said Dr Chris Walzer, an executive director at the Wildlife Conservation Society, who was not involved in the research.

There are other risks too: Cambodia has reported four cases of H5N1 bird flu in people this year, bringing the total to 36 since the virus re-emerged in 2023 and raising concerns that it could evolve to better infect humans; while Nipah first emerged in Malaysia – the virus inspired the blockbuster Contagion, and has a fatality rate as high as 75 per cent.

Southeast Asia also contends with known infections, such as arboviruses like dengue and Zika, while malaria is surging in Indonesia – there was a 30 per cent jump in cases in 2025, to 706,000. In parts of the archipelago and neighbouring Malaysian Borneo, deforestation is also driving monkey malaria to increasingly jump into people.

Called the Health Security Partnership Programme, the UK’s latest initiative is a collaboration with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) to strengthen the region’s capacity to detect, contain and respond to these sorts of known and emerging health threats.

But the first 20 grants unveiled this week – roughly £7.5m of the £25m earmarked when the UK announced the programme last July – will also tackle food safety, antimicrobial resistance, and health-risks linked to climate change. A specialist vaccine manufacturing training scheme will also be set up by the University of Sheffield and Hilleman Laboratories.

Ms Malhotra said it is an example of the UK’s “modern development approach” after sweeping and controversial cuts to foreign aid. Labour has overseen a real-term budget reduction of 40 per cent, as spending fell from 0.5 to 0.3 per cent of gross national income.

In response, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office unveiled “four essential shifts” in strategy: from donor to investor, from international intervention to local partnerships, from providing grants to exchanging expertise, and from service delivery to capacity building.

“This is an example of how we are investing smartly,” said Ms Malhotra. “What we are providing is being amplified as countries build their own public health systems much more effectively… [and then support] the training and capacity of their neighbours.”

She added that the collaboration with Asean, which helped determine gaps in regional capacity and priorities for investment, demonstrates “what a modern partnership should look like”.

The Minister made the comments during a visit this week to a Thai government lab on the outskirts of Bangkok, which hosts the Regional Public Health Laboratory Network (RPHL).

Preparedness capacity currently varies widely across the diverse region, which includes the city-state Singapore and conflict-ridden Myanmar. RPHL was established in 2019 to help bolster national public health laboratories, in part by sharing technical expertise.

The network now includes the 11 Asean countries, plus Pakistan, Nepal and Papua New Guinea, and received a £1.5 million grant in the first round of funding for the Health Security Partnership Programme.

Dr Jintana Sriwongsa, RPHL’s regional programme director, said the money will be used to train specialist laboratory scientists across almost a dozen key disciplines, to reinforce standards for biosecurity and outbreak response, and to expand networks of experts to share knowledge and collaborate – both in ‘peacetime’ and when crises strike.

“We want to move away from a disease specific approach, to talking about systems,” said Dr Jintana. “It’s a matter of how to build the foundation blocks of a strong and flexible laboratory network across the region, to respond to the different challenges we face.”

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