Digital Tools in One Health

Overall project value

The Global Programme for “Pandemic Prevention and Response, One Health” (GP PPOH) aims to enable selected countries and regions, as well as international organisations, to develop effective approaches for pandemic and epidemic prevention and response within the framework of One Health (OH).

Project description

“One Health” is an integrated, unifying approach encompassing human, animal, and environmental health. The importance of an OH framework was known before Covid-19, but the pandemic has reinforced the need for such a framework and underlined the importance that digital tools can play in strengthening it. The GP PPOH plans to support partner countries and organisations in addressing One Health challenges, such as fragmented IT-systems, inadequate infrastructure and regulatory frameworks, sector-specific silos, reliance on paper-based data management etc. In this context, management4health has been commissioned by GIZ to provide advice on digital tools for pandemic prevention and reaction (PP&R) and One Health.

The key work packages of our engagement in the project include:

Develop an inventory of digital tools for One Health that cover at least two of the three sectors of One Health i.e., human health, animal health or environmental health.

Mapping of relevant stakeholders: Navigate the landscape and identify key stakeholders involved in the development, implementation, funding, and/ or use of digital tools for PP&R and One Health.

Country Analysis Vietnam: Support the global project of GIZ in Vietnam “to improve technical, human, and institutional capacity to monitor and analyse disease data and to forecast disease events by using a One Health approach”.

Support GIZ in advising BMZ in response to different requests (drafting of briefings, speaking points, and responses to inquiries) in the space of digital tools for PP&R and One Health.

Technical advice to the global and sector projects of GIZ: Provide technical advice to global and sector projects on a range of topics closely linked to PP&R and One Health, including digital tools for One Health and stakeholders active in this space.

During project implementation, one other work package was added with a focus on country-specific analysis:

Country Analysis Option 1: Selva Maya: Attain a unified surveillance and monitoring system for One Health. The objective of the project was to identify institutions relevant to One Health (key stakeholders) and capture in a standardised manner data management systems used by relevant institutions (inventory of digital tools).

Results

To date the project delivered the following results:

• an online database with 62 digital tools and 118 stakeholders identified
• successfully completed support to Vietnam, resulting in an end of engagement report submitted to GIZ
• survey report from approximately 32 stakeholders in Selva Maya. This report is currently being assessed with a view to identifying entry points for next steps, including thematic areas to consider in dialog-based engagement with key stakeholders in Selva Maya going forward
• ad-hoc support to the Sector and Global programmes of GIZ
• briefing papers and presentations on One Health that were presented to GIZ staff

Key recommendations include:

• the need to align the different One Health projects within GIZ that involve digital tools for One Health
• the need to transfer the online database and its maintenance to a hosting provider endorsed by GIZ
• the need to agree on next action points regarding support to the Sector and Global programmes

These key recommendations will also inform next steps as we work to close the project by 15^th January 2024.