Dr. Misaki Wayengera, a researcher attached to the Department of Pathology at Makerere University’s College of Health Sciences, has cruised to the final race in the WHO Africa Innovation Challenge after impressing judges with his ground-breaking invention that diagnoses hemorrhagic fevers.

After futile efforts to attract funding from the Ugandan government, in 2013, Dr. Wayengera finally won a $100,000 grant from Grand Challenges Canada to create Pan-Filovirus Rapid Diagnostic Test, a paper-strip test, similar to the one used in pregnancy but used in detecting Ebola and Marburg viruses.

The award-winning researcher, who holds a Bachelor of Medicine and Human Surgery from Makerere University, a master’s degree in Bioentrepreneurship and a Ph.D. degree in Pathogenomics from Toronto, Canada – had been working on Ebola since it first broke out in Gulu, Masindi, and Mbarara districts of Uganda in 2000.

So, by the time of inventing the Pan-Filovirus Rapid Diagnostic Test, Dr. Misaki Wayengera was way north of the 10,000 Hour Rule.

To commercialize his project, Misaki told thisisafrica.me in 2015 that he needed about US$100 million to build a facility that will house state-of-the-art laboratories.