Business Post Contributor
By Ashemiriogwa Emmanuel
No fewer than four Nigerians have been sponsored by the United States Government to participate in the advanced Public Health Emergency Management (PHEM) Fellowship program.
The two-week advanced PHEM program is focused on core principles of an Incident Management System (IMS) as an efficient coordination mechanism for responding to small disease outbreaks.
The training, which will take place at the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, also covers more significant public health emergencies such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
The sponsorship was disclosed by the United States Consul General, Mrs Claire Pierengelo, during the closing ceremony and certification of participants of the USG-supported Public Health Emergency Management Professional Certificate Program held in Lagos.
She said, “Emergency Management is one of the 11 capacity building prioritized by the USG in its support of Nigeria.
“Our primary goal is to continue supporting Nigeria to achieve the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) 2024 targets and the International Health Regulations (IHR) requirements by strengthening workforce development, surveillance, emergency response, and laboratory capacity, among other areas.”
According to her, the funding of the selected participant highlights the United States’ continued strategic partnership with Nigeria to support health security and response to disease threats.
“As Nigeria consolidates country capacity for public health response by establishing State Public Health Emergency Operations Centres (PHEOC) across the country, we envision expanding PHEM capacity across Nigeria by training more stakeholders to ensure adequate knowledge, competencies, and skills to efficiently manage technical operations of the PHEOCs,” Mrs Pierengelo said.
The Consul General noted that the PHEM professional certification program was one such training initiative that will adequately position Nigeria for epidemic and pandemic response now and into the future.
“I thank Dr Chikwe and the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) team for providing the opportunity for this transformative collaboration.
“I would like to thank the US-CDC for their leadership and Georgetown University for their efforts in working with the government and other partners to implement the PHEM program in Nigeria,” she added.
