Strengthening field epidemiology workforce and multi-source collaborative surveillance in WHO South-East Asia Region

Background

WHO South-East Asia (SEA) Region continues to face health emergencies of various hazards, including infectious disease epidemics and pandemics, natural disasters, humanitarian crisis, and food safety events. The COVID-19 pandemic has posed enormous negative consequences on health, society and economy, while countries also gained critical lessons on what has worked and what needs to be improved. WHO Regional Office for South-East Asia (SEARO) has therefore facilitated synthesis of lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic and other emergencies in the SEA Region[1], based on which SEARO also facilitated the development of Regional Strategic Roadmap for Health Security and Health System Resilience 2023-2027 [2] which was endorsed by the Member States in the SEA Region at 75th Session of the WHO Regional Committee in 2022.

One of the lessons from COVID-19 mentioned by multiple Member States was the critical importance of field epidemiology, while there have not been sufficient number of trained field epidemiologists 1. As such, Regional Strategic Roadmap for Health Security and Health System Resilience 203-2027 selected strengthening of field epidemiology as one of key priorities in the SEA Region 2. Subsequently, SEARO organized a regional consultation meeting in Bangkok (September 2022), where representatives of Member States discussed concrete priority actions to strengthen field epidemiology workforce [3]. This regional consultation meeting recommended various regional actions on filed epidemiology training proramme (FETP); for example, development of regional roadmap on FETP, collective advocacy to raise regard for FETP, documenting FETP impact during COVID-19, and strengthening regional FETP community 3.

WHO has received funding from the European Union to implement a project to strengthen Pandemic Preparedness and Response in Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries. As part of this project, ASEAN plus three field epidemiology training network (FETN) and WHO agreed to conduct a series of webinars and in-person workshops throughout 2023 to further improve training approaches for field epidemiologists tailored to ASEAN countries, and to strengthen the community of field epidemiology trainers. So far two webinars and one in-person workshop were conducted, while the project will continue towards the end of 2023 which will include three additional webinars and a in-person workshop to strengthen training approaches and FETP communities among ASEAN plus three countries.

In Asia Pacific, WHO has promoted multi-source surveillance approach – which aims to synthesize multi-source information to inform decision-making during health emergencies. Building on lessons from COVID-19 and other emergencies, WHO recently released global concept paper on collaborative surveillance. Such approach is expected to provide opportunity for countries to further strengthen information for decision making, through enhancing capabilities and collaboration to synthesize mutli-source information from different surveillance systems for disease, threats and vulnerabilities, across systems and sectors. WHO SEARO aims to work with countries to further advance multi-source collaborative surveillance in the WHO SEA Region.

The proposed consultancy will provide strategic and technical support in implementing above mentioned activities.

Work to be performed

Under the technical supervision of the Programme Area Manager – Health Emergency Information and Risk Assessment (HIM) and in coordination with other HIM unit members, the proposed consultant will carry out the following duties.

1. To provide strategic and technical inputs to optimize SEARO WHE’s support for countries in their efforts to strengthen filed epidemiology workforce
   • Facilitate further development of the regional FETP Road Map for WHO SEA Region.
   • Support planning and facilitation of the regional meeting on FETP in WHO SEA Region. This includes providing expert strategic and technical advice for strengthening FETP.
   • Provide expert technical advice on FETP and surveillance to RO and MS
2. To support implementation of the FETP component of the EU-supported project to strengthen Pandemic Preparedness and Response in South-East Asia, in close coordination with ASEAN plus three FETN.
   • Support planning and conduct of webinars and in-person workshops to strengthen training approach, and to strengthen FETP community among ASEAN plus three countries.
   • Develop and deliver 5 days of capacity-building modules on training and learning for ASEAN plus three Member States, incorporating adult learning methods.
3. To develop a framework and tools to further operationalize the multi-source collaborative surveillance in WHO SEA Region.
   • Collaborate with WHO teams and provide expert technical inputs in drafting a simple and practical manual to operationalize multi-source collaborative surveillance in countries, which may cover surveillance information mapping, formation of task-force, and national stakeholder workshop.
   • Develop a field epidemiology training module on multi-source surveillance approach, based on epidemic analysis for decision-making.
4. To provide a brief technical report that summarizes achievements at the end of assignment.

Proposed timelines and location of work

The consultant is expected to work for approximately 60 days during July to December 2023. The consultant will work remotely most the time, except some travel to meetings and missions.

Specific requirements (to be indicated at the time of development of ToRs)

– Educational qualifications required:

Essential

• Advanced university degree (master level or above) in public health, epidemiology, medicine, or other relevant health sciences

Desirable

• Specialization in education, health education, or pedagogy

– Experience required:

Essential

1. At least 10 years of experiences working for public health surveillance, field epidemiology or response for diseases of epidemic and pandemic potential, and/or acute public health events (not just for a single disease programme).
2. Demonstrated experiences in advising field epidemiology training programme, or training field epidemiologists in resource-limited countries.
3. Demonstrated experiences in WHO methods of risk assessment of acute public health events.
4. Demonstrated experiences in developing international guiding documents.
5. Experiences in designing evaluation of public health surveillance or project.
6. At least 4 years of experiences working with a national public health institute, and international public health organization.
7. Experiences working with Ministry of Health of resource-limited countries for surveillance, FETP, outbreak investigation or risk assessment.
8. At least three years of international experiences

Desirable

1. Experiences working with WHO health emergencies progarmme.

– Skills / Technical skills and knowledge:

• Excellent facilitation skills or pedagogical approach in the context of public health
• Advanced knowledge and skills related to field epidemiology
• Good understanding of FETP in resource-limited settings, especially in the Asian context
• Involved in training/capacity building of Member States in disease surveillance, event-based surveillance of acute public health events.
• Familiarity with methods of multi-source surveillance, or epidemic analysis of response decision making
• Skills and knowledge in designing evaluation of public health surveillance or project
• Excellent presentation and communication skills, including writing skills, in simple and clear language
• Proven ability to work in team and produce results under pressure in critical situations.

– Language requirements:

• English (Expert Level)

1. Place of assignment

• Most work will be done remotely, with potential travels to a regional meeting, and some missions to WHO offices (exact dates to be determined later)

[1] https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/363473

[2] https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789290209959

[3] https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/366394