Climate Risk Management of Infectious Diseases

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Climate Risk Management of Infectious Diseases Draft Version August 25, 2011 Draft for Discussion Climate Risk Management of Infectious Diseases Learning from Experience Outcomes & Recommendations from Technical Meeting on Climate Risk Management of Infectious Diseases Associated with Third World Climate Conference August 31 - September 4, 2009 Geneva, Switzerland 1 Draft Version August 25, 2011 ACRONYMS........................................................................................................... 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................... 4 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................... 5 Section 1 Technical Meeting on Lessons and Needs of the Climate and Health Communities of Practice ......................................................................................... 7 1.2 Taking Stock and Learning from the experience of malaria control in Africa ... 8 Section 2 Overview of Diverse Models of Climate and Health Partnerships ..... 10 Section 3 Taking Stock of Climate and Health Partnerships to Identify Best Practices................................................................................................................. 12 Good practices and lessons learned from climate and health partnerships........ 15 1. Good practices and guidance for effective collaboration for climate risk management of infectious diseases ...................................................................... 15 2. Good Practices & Guidance to enhance performance and use of climate informed health decision-support tools and systems (EWS) ................................................ 16 Section 4: Recommendations to key stakeholders for Climate Risk Management of Infectious Diseases............................................................................................. 20 Recommendations Part 1: To WHO and WMO on policy and leadership............. 20 Recommendations Part 2: To Operational Actors on opportunities to increase support ................................................................................................................ 21 Recommendations Part 3: To donors on Priority Investment Areas...................... 24 Section 5: Conclusions........................................................................................... 28 ANNEXES ............................................................................................................. 29 2 Draft Version August 25, 2011 CONTENTS ACRONYMS ACMAD African Centre of Meteorological Application for Development ACPC Africa Climate Policy Center AFRO WHO Africa Regional Office AfDB African Development Bank CHWG Climate and Health Working Group CRM Climate Risk Management DNP Department of National Planning EWS Early Warning Systems ClimDev-Africa Climate for Development Programme for Africa GMP WHO Global Malaria Programme HCF Health and Climate Foundation IFRC International Federation of the Red Cross Red Crescent IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IRI International Research Institute for Climate and Society LSHTM London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine MALOF Malaria Outlook Forum MDG Millennium Development Goals MEWS Malaria Early Warning System MOH Ministry of Health MERIT Meningitis Environmental Risk Information Technologies NOAA National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration PPP Public-Private Partnerships PAHO Pan American Health Organization (WHO) PHE WHO Department of Public Health and Environment RBM Roll Back Malaria Programme UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNEP United Nations Environmental Programme UNICEF United Nations Children's Fund UNFCCC United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change WCC-3 World Climate Conference-3 VIGIRISC African Early Warning and Advisory Climate Services WHA World Health Assembly WHO World Health Organisation WMO World Meteorological Organisation 3 Draft Version August 25, 2011 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors of this report wish to express our appreciation to all who contributed to the success of the technical meeting. Special thanks to the organisers: the IRI Team led by Dr. Madeleine Thomson; the WHO team led by Dr. Maria Neira and Dr. Roberto Bertollini; the WMO focal point for the climate and health sessions, Dr. Leslie Malone; and the Health and Climate Foundation led by Dr. David Rogers. In addition, we would like to acknowledge the other session chairs and discussants: Dr. Marten Van Aalst (Climate Centre, IFRC), Dr. Eric Bertherat (WHO-HQ), Mr. Ali Beyene Beshir (CHWG, Ethiopia), Mr. Mohammed Boulahya (ClimDev-Africa), Dr. Jonathan Cox (LSHTM), Dr. Joaquim Da Silva (WHO, AFRO), Mme. Marie Christine Dufresne (ACMAD, Niger), Dr. Joy Guillemot (WHO), Dr. Mohammed Kadi (ACMAD, Niger), Dr. Simon Mason (IRI, USA), Professor Glenn McGregor (WMO/University of Auckland, NZ), Dr. Giampiero Renzoni (DNP, Colombia), Dr. Juli Trtanj (NOAA, USA) and Dr. Luciano Tuseo (WHO, Madagascar). The full participant list is provided in Annex 2. Report Authors: Joy Guillemot (WHO), Simon Adebola (WHO), Barbara Platzer (IRI) The US Environmental Protection Agency provided funding for this technical meeting through a cooperative agreement with the WHO (CR 834063). The views expressed in this report are those of the authors and participants and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 4 Draft Version August 25, 2011 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The effects on climate on health are now well known. If the health sector expects to appropriately adapt to greater variability and longer term changes in the worlds climate systems, then climate and meteorological information must be taken into greater consideration in health science, practice, and policymaking. To respond to such a significant sectoral need, wide-scale investments in new mechanisms and tools to generate and disseminate meteorological and climate information are being instituted. For such services to be developed in ways which respond to end-user needs and rendered effectively, then extensive dialog between communities of practice must occur. This report reflects the current state of discussion between key actors of the health and meteorological communities at two meetings during the Third World Climate Conference (31 August - 4 September 2009) in Geneva, Switzerland. The WCC-3 aimed to establish a global framework for climate service provision and application, which respond to sectoral needs to be "climate informed". Along with energy, water, agriculture, transportation and tourism, the health sector should be a major consumer of climate and meteorological information. On September 1, a special session on Climate and Human Health identified ways to transform current policies and practices to make the use of climate information more widespread in health decision-making. On September 3, a technical meeting on "Climate Risk Management of Infectious Diseases: Learning from Experience", aimed to share lessons already learned from collaborative endeavors between the health and meteorological communities, and aimed to outline key issues and ways forward towards building a more climate informed health sector. This report presents the dialog and recommendations by the community of practice for directions forward based on experience. The following key points emerged from discussions: • Major policy shifts are occurring in global health and climate policy arenas which depend upon effective collaboration between the health and meteorological communities to achieve declared goals. High level commitments and visions are called for to create more integrated and coordinated infectious disease surveillance and control programmes which appropriately respond to the dynamics of climate change and health policy. • Clear and evidence-based guidelines and standards for the use of climate information in health decision making is needed. Operational research to provide effective examples of good practice, and best define standards for temporal, spatial and spectral aspects of meteorological and environmental data for health decision-making and research are key. • Learning and evaluation of current projects and collaborations are essential to develop better models for developing and implementing climate services for health. The experiences of meteorological applications and partnerships for malaria control in East and Southern Africa is a good starting point to explore opportunities in other regions and for other climate-sensitive diseases. 5 Draft Version August 25, 2011 • New opportunities to increase support of core services and capacities for climate risk management should be capitalized on. Raising awareness that climate services for health will be an underlying and integral part of climate adaptation, disaster risk reduction, health system strengthening and integrated disease control should continue. • Innovative use of new and appropriate technologies can greatly strengthen health data collection, processing, transmission and communication for a range of activities from research to monitoring diseases in real-time. • Strong incentives, personal motivation, and champion individuals are essential for climate and health collaborations to flourish and provide the basis of information and communications inform disease control actions. • Innovation in multi stakeholder partnerships, including better engagement of the private sector will be key for climate risk management of infectious diseases. Opportunities to bridge resources, and
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