OMICs data from Tunisian population: challenges and opportunities in the era of precision medicine

The transition to precision medicine (PM) is revolutionizing healthcare by enabling diagnostics and treatments tailored to individual molecular and genetic profiles, with omics sciences at its core. In Tunisia, growing interest is seen through initiatives such as Personalized Medicine in North Africa (PerMediNA).

This study assesses Tunisia's readiness for PM by mapping publicly available omics datasets and related publications using Tunisian human data. A structured search across PubMed and major repositories covered studies published between 2010 and 2023 involving high-throughput technologies.

A total of 11 omics datasets were found, mainly genomic, alongside 104 publications, of which 96 focused on genomics. Whole exome sequencing (n = 46) and targeted gene panels (n = 37) were the most used approaches. Only six proteomics, one transcriptomics, and one metagenomics studies were identified; no epigenomics or metabolomics datasets were found. Research centered mainly on cancers, including breast, colorectal, and leukemia. While Tunisia shows progress in genomics, major gaps exist in other omics domains.

Advancing PM in Tunisia requires establishing a national omics data repository with ethical governance, promoting North - South collaborations to build capacity in non-genomic omics fields, and fostering public - private partnerships to strengthen infrastructure, data sharing, and sustainable research development.