National Consultant, Kazakhstan: One Health Catalyst

Background The health of humans and animals is vitally interlinked. A majority of emerging and endemic human diseases have their origins in animals, be they transmitted directly, through food or via the environment. Animal-specific diseases can also have indirect implications for human health through food security and other impacts on livelihood. There is therefore a shared responsibility and synergic potential for collaboration between public and animal health sectors to deal with zoonotic diseases and other threats at the animal-human interface.

WHO Member States adopted the International Health Regulations (IHR, 2005), for the prevention and control of events that may constitute a public health emergency of international concern. The IHR Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF) has been developed to provide a comprehensive country-level overview of the implementation of requirements under the IHR to develop and monitor capacities to detect, monitor and maintain public health capacities and functions.

The OIE is the International Organization responsible for developing international standards, guidelines and recommendations for animal health and zoonosis. OIE’s Performance of Veterinary Services (PVS) Pathway is a range of tools to provide countries with a comprehensive understanding of strengths and weaknesses in their veterinary services. The joint use of WHO IHR MEF and OIE PVS Pathway can result in better alignment of capacity building approach and strategies between human and animal health services of a country. For this purpose, the IHR-PVS National Bridging Workshops (NBW) were developed. A NBW is a three-day event which enables the animal health and the human health sectors in countries to explore overlapping areas and develop, where relevant, appropriate bridges to facilitate coordination. A structured approach using user-friendly material, case studies and group exercises enables the identification of synergies, review of gaps and the definition of operational strategies to be used by policy makers for concerted corrective measures.

The key output of these NBW is the NBW Roadmap, a joint action plan that the animal health and human health sectors have developed jointly to improve their collaboration. As part of the NBW Follow-up strategy, a nationally-recruited One Health Catalyst will be positioned at the interface between the two sectors. The key objective is to evaluate and catalyze the implementation of the National Bridging Workshops roadmap and identify challenges in the operationalization of the collaboration at the human-animal interface. This will contribute to strengthen the core capacities needed to comply with the International Health Regulations (IHR, 2005).

Deliverables

The duties of the consultant will be as follows:

1. Liaise regularly with focal points from the animal health and human health sectors and organize short regular meetings to analyze and continuously improve the collaboration between the two sectors in the prevention, detection and response to zoonotic diseases and other health events at the animal-human interface;
2. Advocate and push for the implementation of activities jointly defined during the NBW and listed in the NBW Roadmap, by identifying next operational steps for each prioritized activity, providing technical expertise in the domain when needed and logistical support (e.g. organizing meetings, videoconferences,);
3. Organize a meeting at national level to conduct the NBW follow-up survey in order to assess the status of implementation of the roadmap activities, identify the key bottlenecks and the areas where support from the Tripartite could be needed
4. Identify challenges in the operationalization of the collaboration between the human and animal health sectors at country level, propose solutions and possible need for support by the tripartite partners;
5. Identify low-cost high-impact NBW roadmap activities which could be funded by the tripartite;
6. Actively contribute to the network of One Health catalysts and participate in the animation of the NBW community (online forums, yearly NBW network consultative meeting) in order to gather knowledge on lessons learned, good practices, challenges encountered;
7. Serve as in-country technical focal point and advocate for other tripartite tools, including the Joint Risk Assessment tool (JRA), the Multisectoral Coordination Mechanism tool (MCM) and the Surveillance and Information Sharing Tool (SISOT).

Contract

12 months

Educational qualifications, experience, skills and languages

Educational Qualifications

Required: University degree in public health or veterinary studies

Work Experience

Required • At least 5 years’ experience in public health, food safety or zoonotic diseases detection, prevention and control. • Experience with public health or animal health systems in host country. • Very good understanding of the One Health approach and how it can be implemented. • Experience in coordination, collaboration and facilitation of capacity building activities across the human-animal interface.

Skills and Knowledge

• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills and sensitivity to political and cultural issues • Proven ability to work in multisectoral teams • Proven ability to meet deadlines

Languages

Required: Excellent knowledge of the English and Russian language

Supervision

The consultant will report to the Senior Medical Adviser and the WHO Representative (WR) to Kazakhstan.

Remuneration and budget

Remuneration is based on classified requirements of the terms of reference of the individual consultant contract with related academic and professional experience applied for the grade in accordance with WHO’s national consultant’s pay rate.

Any travel costs will be covered separately in line with the WHO Travel policy modalities.