Global Health Security Consultant | Conakry, Guinea | 2024 At Chemonics

The USAID Frontier Health Markets (FHM) Engage project aims to improve the functioning of local health markets and support the effective engagement and inclusion of the private sector to advance voluntary family planning, maternal and child health, malaria, TB, and HIV/AIDS outcomes . FHM Engage employs several key approaches, including a market development approach, adaptive learning, and working through regional and local actors to properly contextualize challenges and identify sustainable solutions to improve private sector health markets.

FHM Engage seeks to support USAID Guinea to advance and accelerate improvements in Family Planning (FP), Maternal and Child Health (MCH), Malaria, and Global Health Security (GHS) outcomes by working with local partners for sustainable provision of quality health services, products, and information.

The project is expected to contribute to preventing, quickly detecting and responding to infectious zoonotic diseases by further improving and sustaining JEE scores in the following technical areas:

• Prevention, Early Detection, and Rapid Response to Outbreaks: Work with civil society organizations to reinforce community-based surveillance.
• National Laboratory Systems: Strengthen local NGO capacity in specimen referral system with the objective to transfer the referral management to the NGO or a private sector entity while using a phased approach.
• Infection Prevention and Control (IPC): Work with civil Society organization and COSAH before and during infectious disease outbreaks
• RCCE: Strengthen 2-3 NGOs capacity in the RCCE domain to conduct mobilization and social behavior change activities.

The Joint External Evaluation (JEE) conducted in September 2017 and May 2023 showed that Guinea has improved its JEE score in Risk Communication and Community engagement, in surveillance and in most key laboratory deliverables. Zoonotic diseases, such as Ebola, Lassa, Avian Influenza in poultry and Wild birds, rabies, and other vaccine preventable diseases (measles, yellow fever, diphtheria) were prevalent in Guinea over the past few years. With support from global health partners, Guinea has strengthened the capacity to prevent, detect, report, and respond to public health threats in alignment with the International Health Regulations. In accomplishing those results, local stakeholders, including local NGOs, play a key role in improving the technical areas of Risk Communication and Community Engagement (RCCE), Laboratory and surveillance. This localization activity will directly work with local NGOs to further improve JEE scores and sustain current achievements.

This support will use both evidence-based and innovative approaches for various GHS domains to accomplish the International Health Regulation objectives. To maximize its impact, the consultant will help FHM Engage to carefully align its interventions according to the International Health Regulation Framework and the Joint External Evaluation (JEE) priority areas which are benefiting from ongoing activities funded by USAID Guinea.

1. Scope of Work:
2. Define the Context and Challenges for Global Health Security. The consultant will conduct a combination of a desk review and key stakeholder interviews to understand the existing context and challenges related to GHS and JEE scores in Guinea, including but not limited to what community surveillance system is currently in place; role and status of paid/unpaid CHWs, transportation/tracking of specimens collected in collaboration with ongoing projects; public/private labs and test result notification systems.
3. Capacity assessment. The consultant will also support the identification of NGOs and assess their capacity for supporting FHM to deliver on the GHS project objectives as listed above.
4. Develop a 3 year strategy and workplan for achieving the GHS objectives as defined in the assessment (1 and 2 above).
5. Deliverables:
6. Desk review report summarizing the existing context and challenges as related to GHS and JEE scores in Guinea for all areas described in the section above (20-30 pages in MS Word).
7. Mapping of local NGOs , their capacity and their potential. This information will be summarized in a report (approximately 50 pages) and include:
   1. List of organizations that may help to support GHS in Guinea, their current funding, and current activities (30-40 pages in MS Word).
   2. Criteria to determine the NGOs with the capacity highest and greatest potential for partnership and to be recipients of USAID funds. Based on these criteria, the consultant will develop a list of organizations with high potential for partnership and to be prime recipients of USAID funding. The consultant will also include strategy for how the capacity of these organizations will be developed so they are able to receive these awards.
   3. List of high-priority activities to support GHS and which organizations are best suited to carry these out. Priority activities should help the program to: raise JEE score, improve early detection and rapid response to outbreaks, support national laboratory systems, improve IPC and RCCE.
8. Strategy document and workplan to improve JEE scores in Guinea for all areas described in the section above.
9. Qualifications of the Consultant:

• Bachelors degree with at least 10 years of relevant experience or Masters Degree with at least 8 years of experience.
• Experience working with Global Health Security and/or One Health programming.
• Demonstrated capacity to develop and produce strategy documents for multi-dimensional global health programs required.
• Demonstrated experience working with USAID programs.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills required. Must be fluent in written and spoken French and English.

Duration of Assignment: This assignment is expected to be completed in 30 days of LOE between May – July 2024.

1. Location of Assignment : Conakry, Guinea with travel to other regions of the country (to be determined by FHM Engage team).
2. Supervision of the Consultant: the consultant will report to the Chief of Party

USAID’s Fronter Health Markets (FHM) Engage project aims to improve the functioning of local health markets and support effective engagement and inclusion of the private sector to advance voluntary family planning outcomes, maternal and child health, prevention of malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS. FHM Engage uses several key methods, including a market development approach, adaptive learning and collaboration with regional and local stakeholders to properly contextualize challenges and identify sustainable solutions to improve private sector health markets .

FHM Engage seeks to support USAID Guinea to advance and accelerate improvements in the areas of family planning (FP), maternal and child health (MCH), malaria, and global health security (GHS) by working with local partners for the sustainable provision of quality health services, products and information.

The project is expected to contribute to the prevention, rapid detection and response to zoonotic infectious diseases by improving and maintaining the results of the WHO Joint External Evaluation (JEE) in the following technical areas:

• Prevention, early detection and rapid response to epidemics: Collaborate with civil society organizations to strengthen community-based surveillance.
• National laboratory systems: Strengthen the capacity of local NGOs in the sample referral system, with the aim of transferring management of referral to the NGO or a private sector entity in a phased approach.
• Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) : Working with civil society organizations and COSAH before and during infectious disease outbreaks.
• Risk communication and community engagement : strengthen the capacities of 2-3 NGOs in the area of ​​risks and community engagement to carry out mobilization and social behavior change activities.

The Joint External Evaluation (JEE) conducted in September 2017 and May 2023 showed that Guinea improved its JEE score in risk communication and community engagement, in surveillance and in most key laboratory deliverables . Zoonotic diseases, such as Ebola, Lassa, avian influenza in poultry and wild birds, rabies and other vaccine-preventable diseases (measles, yellow fever, diphtheria) were prevalent in Guinea in recent years . With the support of global health partners, Guinea has strengthened its capacities to prevent, detect, report and respond to public health threats, in accordance with international health regulations. To achieve these results, local stakeholders, including local NGOs, play a key role in improving the technical areas of risk communication and community engagement, laboratory and surveillance. This localization activity will work directly with local NGOs to further improve the results of the EEC and maintain current achievements.

This support will use innovative and evidence-based approaches to various areas of SSM to achieve the objectives of the International Health Regulations. To maximize its impact, the consultant will help FHM Engage carefully align its interventions with the International Health Regulations framework and Joint External Evaluation (JEE) priority areas that benefit from ongoing USAID Guinea-funded activities.

1. Work’s extent :
2. Define the context and challenges of global health security. The consultant will conduct a desk study and interviews with key stakeholders to understand the current context and challenges related to SSM and EEC scores in Guinea, including but not limited to the system community surveillance currently in place, the role and status of paid/unpaid CHWs, transport/tracking of samples collected in collaboration with ongoing projects, public/private laboratories and reporting systems for screening results.
3. Capacity assessment. The consultant will also support the identification of NGOs and assess their capacity to help FHM achieve the SSM project objectives as listed above.
4. Develop a three-year strategy and work plan to achieve the SSM objectives defined in the evaluation (1 and 2 above).
5. Deliverables:
6. Desk study report summarizing the existing context and challenges related to SSM and EEC results in Guinea for all areas described in the section above (20-30 pages in MS Word).
7. Mapping of local NGOs , their capacities and their potential . This information will be summarized in a report (approximately 50 pages) and will include:
   1. List of organizations that can support SSM in Guinea, their current funding and ongoing activities (30-40 pages in MS Word).
   2. Criteria for determining NGOs with the greatest capacity and potential for partnership and to receive funds from USAID. Based on these criteria, the consultant will establish a list of organizations with strong partnership potential and that could be the main beneficiaries of USAID funds. The consultant will also include a strategy to develop the capacity of these organizations so that they are able to receive these funds.
   3. List of high priority activities to support the GHS and organizations best able to carry them out. Priority activities are expected to help the program: increase JEE score, improve early detection and rapid response to outbreaks, support national laboratory systems, improve PCI and risk communication and community engagement.
8. Strategic document and work plan to improve JEE results in Guinea for all areas described in the section above.
9. Consultant Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree with at least 10 years of relevant experience or Master’s degree with at least 8 years of experience.
• Experience in global health security and/or One Health programming
• Proven ability to develop and produce strategic documents for multidimensional global health programs (required).
• Proven experience working with United States Agency for International Development (USAID) programs.
• Exceptional written and oral communication skills are required. Applicants must speak and write French and English fluently.

Duration of the mission : This mission is expected to be completed in 30 days of LOE between May and July 2024.

1. Duty station : Conakry, Guinea, with travel to other regions of the country (to be determined by the FHM Engage team).
2. Consultant supervision : The consultant will report to the party leader.