CDC Investments in Public Health Programs Help Zambia Respond to COVID-19

CDC Investments in Public Health Programs Help Zambia Respond to COVID-19 (3-minute video)

Title: CDC Investments in Public Health Programs Help Zambia Respond to COVID-19

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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

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Dr. Andrew Auld, Country Director, CDC Zambia: CDC Zambia provided pivotal support to Zambia in setting up its laboratory system for COVID-19 response and provided support to all components of the laboratory system across the country. Starting with technical support to actually get the labs capable of testing for COVID-19 and providing some of the supplies to do that in some of the training for the laboratorians to be able to, do the COVID-19 testing, CDC Zambia has been able to again work with the government to demonstrate impact of those investments.

Roma Chilengi, Director General Zambia National Public Health Institute: I think that we have very quickly adapted our structures to sort of leading conventions around how a public health institute should operate. The U.S. CDC were very instrumental in providing the technical support to feed into what would be the terms and mandates of an institute.

Dr. Andrew Auld, Country Director, CDC Zambia: The field epidemiology training program is an important program supported by CDC in Zambia since 2014. It’s modeled after the U.S. CDC’s own Epidemic Intelligence Service program, and it provides training to health professionals across the spectrum in disease surveillance and response activities to improve the ability of national public health response systems to address emerging public health threats.

Roma Chilengi, Director General Zambia National Public Health Institute: I think we can talk about ZNPHI (Zambia National Public Health Institute) being a model here in Africa. Why? Because the concept of public health institutes to Africa is a generally new phenomenon, and not many countries in Africa actually have a structured public health institute. We are among the few you can count on your hands.

Dr. Andrew Auld, Country Director, CDC Zambia: And CDC Zambia has been able to work in partnership with the Government of Zambia to implement very high-quality public health programs in a sustainable way.

Roma Chilengi, Director General Zambia National Public Health Institute: I think that the field epidemiology training we are running is specifically designed for institutions like and mandates like the one we have.

Dr. Andrew Auld, Country Director, CDC Zambia: In order to address these public health threats, there’s a need to continue to invest and strengthen public health emergency operations centers, and ZNPHI and national public health institutes throughout the region to ensure that emerging threats are quickly contained and do not become global health threats.

Text on slate: To learn more about CDC’s global health work visit www.cdc.gov/globalheatlh/.

Follow @CDCGlobal on social media.

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