Washington, D.C., October 24, 2024 (PAHO) – The Preparedness and Resilience for Emerging Threats (PRET) initiative organizes quarterly virtual Peer learning on pandemic planning calls. These calls provide a collaborative space for countries to learn from one another and share experiences in pandemic planning. For instance, participants explore examples of national plans, successful approaches, challenges, and key learnings.
On October 24, 2024, a session was held that brought together 93 national, regional, and global focal points for pandemic planning. The session provided participants with an overview of the PRET initiative, offering an opportunity to consider key elements in pandemic preparedness through an interactive exercise titled “Who Does What When”, as well as a panel featuring national experiences on multisectoral engagement in pandemic planning. During the meeting, participants identified potential roles and actions for different sectors throughout the scaling up and down of a pandemic response.
Some highlights of the panel included insights from Argentina, Guatemala, Belize, and the United States, showcasing different approaches to strengthening pandemic preparedness and promoting intersectoral collaboration.
Panel Highlights
Dr. Cecilia Gonzalez Lebrero, Director of the Epidemiology Department at the Ministry of Health of Argentina, highlighted how a national intersectoral meeting helped identify opportunities to strengthen and expand existing capacities. The country developed a collaborative federal approach with the participation of areas and sectors of the Ministry of Health, Secretariat of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries (SENASA), and decentralized organizations (ANMAT, ANLIS Institutes, jurisdictional representatives) among others. Dr Gonzalez emphasized the importance of institutionalizing intra- and intersectoral collaboration through a legal framework to enable and support collaborative actions.
In Guatemala, Dr. María del Mar Ordoñez, responsible for respiratory virus surveillance at the Ministry of Health and Social Assistance, shared the country’s efforts to incorporate intersectoral collaborations to update its national respiratory pathogens pandemic preparedness plan. This process included reviewing the legal framework related to PRET 5Cs: collaborative surveillance, clinical management, access to countermeasures, and community protection, and especially, emergency coordination to identify gaps and barriers for an effective implementation of measures. This review was the basis to align the pandemic response plan with the national multi-hazards response plan which resulted in the inclusion of a chapter related to threats of biological origin, embedding respiratory pathogen pandemic preparedness into the wider emergency coordination system.
Dr. Russell Manzanero, Director of the Epidemiology Unit at the Ministry of Health and Wellness of Belize, presented the country´s multisectoral One Health Committee including who is involved and the issues it seeks to address – including pandemic preparedness as well as other challenges (e.g. clinical governance research, food safety issues, antimicrobial resistance). In addition to emphasizing the importance of a legislative committee, Dr Manzanero highlighted that having an intersectoral committee has facilitated the implementation of a One Health approach through various activities, for instance: training staff such as epidemiologists (FETP Frontline course with a One Health approach), physicians, veterinarians, agronomists, environmental scientists, and other relevant professionals with an interdisciplinary approach to strengthen rapid response teams.
Finally, Dr. Colin Basler, Deputy Director of the One Health Coordination Unit (OHCU) at the CDC in the United States, discussed how intergovernmental coordination strengthens pandemic preparedness. Dr Basler stressed how a clear leadership from the U.S. OHCU Interagency Core Leadership Team (CDC, Department of the Interior and US Development Agency) through the support of working groups is key to implement a One Health approach ant to exchange information. He emphasized the importance of multisectoral engagement in advisory and operational groups to make sure everyone plays a role.
Joint Reflection
This Peer Learning call showcased the strong focus on and commitment to multisectoral collaboration for pandemic preparedness planning in the Region of the Americas. All four panelists agreed that governance frameworks for collaborative actions across government agencies are essential for both preparedness and response during pandemics because it allows to advance joint objectives while minimizing risks and conflicts among partners. Some examples of how collective multisectoral actions supported by a clear legal framework can support pandemic preparedness and response include:
- to promote timely sharing of knowledge and information among partners, especially those beyond the health sector or directly involved in surveillance and clinical care associated with respiratory pathogens (e.g. emergency coordination, human-animal interface)
- to describe triggers and responsibilities for when it is necessary to pool resources (e.g. human or financial) to mitigate the health and socioeconomic impact associated with pandemics.
- to institutionalize, fund and monitor the performance of collaborations such as One Health Committees and Intergovernmental Coordination Units to improve national preparedness and opportunities for collaboration, for instance advisory groups or training.
The panelists from the four countries also stressed the need to update and align national plans with multi-hazards response frameworks to ensure roles of the different stakeholders involved during a respiratory pandemic are well defined. The experience from the panelists demonstrates that collaborations or alignment of relevant national plans is crucial to leverage capacities that exist in both cross-cutting and hazard-specific systems. PRET’s core components and operational stages are useful to determine which roles and risk classifications need to be described across national plans to enable collaborations and exchange of information. The session demonstrated how peer exchanges help share best practices and address challenges, fostering resilient communities for future health emergencies.
