Event-based Surveillance (EBS) is a type of organized public health surveillance that collects and analyzes signals that are of potential risk to public health from channels outside of routine surveillance systems. This information can be rumors and other ad-hoc reports transmitted through formal channels (i.e., established routine reporting systems) and informal channels (i.e., media, health workers, and nongovernmental organizations reports).

 

In the Eastern Mediterranean, EMPHNET continues the provision of technical and logistic support to ministries of health to strengthen EBS systems with a focus on COVID-19 and other respiratory disease surveillance.  

 

In Libya, EMPHNET has been providing logistic support to conduct municipality and community-level training targeting EBS focal persons/ surveillance officers and frontline personnel as well as community-level training.

 

As part of this support, EBS Training Workshop for Surveillance Officers (Focal Points) was conducted in September 2022 for 10 focal points from 5 municipalities Derna, Ghat, Musrata, Hay Alandalous and Soug Aljoma.  Additionally, 2 EBS Training Workshops for Frontline Personnel (48 community health volunteers) has been conducted in October 2022.

 

The trainings aimed to provide Community Health Volunteers at the municipalities with the knowledge and skills to detect and report unusual events that may be occurring in their communities. The trainings focused on enabling them to define the importance of surveillance and EBS in the country; identify potential information sources for EBS and define priority EBS events to be captured; determine EBS data to be collected, tracked, and reported; define signal detection and the reporting methods for EBS; and learn the roles and responsibilities of CHV and community engagement.

 

This collaboration is part of EMPHNET’s work in expanding efforts and strategies to improve rapid response to public health emergencies from the region to the globe.