Seychelles host African Regional training of trainers’ workshop on Public Health Emergency Operation Centres |03 May 2023

Delegates and guests in a souvenir photograph (Photo: Patrick Joubert)

The Seychelles Ministry of Health is hosting the 3rd African Regional training of trainers’ workshop on Public Health Emergency Operation Centres (PHEOCs) in collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO), the Africa Centre for Disease Control (Africa CDC), United States Centre for Disease Control (US CDC), the West African Health Organisation (WAHO), the UK Health and Security Agency (UKHSA), and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI).

This PHEOCs training of trainers workshop, being held at the Savoy Seychelles Resort & Spa from May 2-14, 2023, is the 3rd in the African Region. The two previous ones took place in Ethiopia and Kenya in 2019 and 2021 respectively. It is unique in that it will build on Covid-19 response experiences of countries in the region and in Seychelles. 

Forty-two (42) participants from 27 countries and regional bodies across Africa are taking part in this training.

The main objective is to equip the trained trainers towards strengthening PHEOCs in their respective countries including through training of others at sub-national levels in incident and PHEOC management. The trained trainers are also expected to be part of the African Region pool of experts in health emergencies management as well as lead countries to conduct simulation exercises to test systems/competencies and intra as well as after-action reviews.

It was the Minister for Health, Peggy Vidot, who launched the two-week training of trainer’s workshop yesterday. She was accompanied by the principal secretary for Health, Dr Bernard Valentin and the Public Health Commissioner, Dr Jude Gedeon.

Apart from health representatives from our country, participants for this meeting are from Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cape Verde, Chad, Congo, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Gambia, Guinea, Kenya, Mali, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritania, Mauritius, Niger, Nigeria, Namibia, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Tunisia, Uganda and Zimbabwe. Our country established its PHEOC in March 2020 to manage the Covid-19 pandemic.

Addressing the participants, Minister Vidot, who welcomed the foreign delegates to our shores, said as a small island state, we remain vulnerable to many of these emergencies as well as events associated with climate change.

“Covid-19 has taught us all many important lessons about emergency preparedness.  It has clearly demonstrated that borders epidemics respect no national frontiers, what happens in one country impacts several other countries, hence the need for all countries to have robust systems in place to coordinate the preparation for and response to Public Health emergencies. It is therefore of paramount importance that our continent, as well as all other countries, make this concerted effort to strengthen our preparedness and response to such events,” said Minister Vidot.

The minister called on the participants to use the meeting to come up with concrete actions for further strengthening public health EOCs, most of which were established to help in coordinating the Covid-19 response and follow-on health emergencies.

African Region countries continue to have a disproportionate high risk of public health emergencies from disease outbreaks, natural disasters and man-made calamities. In addition to Covid-19, the region has recently had outbreaks of Ebola, Cholera, Maburg, Monkey Pox; natural disasters of flooding, cyclones and man-made calamities from armed conflicts among others.

All these continue to underscore the need to maintain PHEOCs that serve as hubs for coordinating response to public health emergencies. PHEOCs bring together multi-sector and multidisciplinary experts to coordinate emergency management efforts in a structured manner using the incident management system (IMS). Thereby enhancing collaboration, communication, and availability of real-time and quality information for evidence-based decision making.

The workshop will include presentations by various facilitators, group work, group presentations, plenary discussions and stimulus exercises.

Patrick Joubert/press release from WHO liaison office, Victoria