By Angela Atabo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)

The International Health Regulations (IHR) ,2005, are an international legal instrument that covers measures for preventing the transnational spread of infectious diseases among others and Nigeria has not relented I’m striving to achieve its objectives .

In order for Nigeria to uphold its commitment to robustly monitor its capacity under the IHR, the second Joint External Evaluation(JEE) was initiated.

This pivotal evaluation framework, operating on a voluntary and cooperative basis, endeavours to assess countries within the IHR framework in their collective endeavors to prevent, detect, and respond to diverse public health threats, encompassing natural, accidental, or deliberate incidents.

The JEE, strategically designed to unearth a nation’s deficiencies, subsequently enables prioritisation in the development of public health infrastructure, aimed at bridging critical gaps.

Based on this, stakeholders from the JEE multidisciplinary team of experts are meeting at the Joint External Evaluation Internal Assessment for Nigeria workshop from July 24 to 28 to assess the country’s preparedness and response capabilities across 19 technical areas in Ministries, Departments and Agencies, to detect, prevent and respond to infectious diseases in the country.

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC), said Nigeria must remain steadfast in transforming its health security.

The Director-General, NCDC, Dr Ifedayo Adetifa, said that with unity, the country would forge ahead, transforming challenges into opportunities and safeguarding the health and well-being of every Nigerian.

According to hom, JEE is an essential tool that provided an unbiased and comprehensive assessment of the nation’s ability to prevent, detect, and respond to health threats.

He said that the IHR (2005)is a legally binding framework that requires all World Health Organization (WHO) member countries to develop and maintain their capacity to prevent, detect, assess and respond to public health risks and emergencies.

“Nigeria conducted its first Joint External Evaluation (JEE) in June 2017, using the JEE 1.0 tool and based on the conventional requirement by the World Health Assembly for countries to conduct JEE five-yearly, the country is due for another JEE.

“To enhance health security in the country, the government and relevant stakeholders have implemented various strategies – disease surveillance and response, health emergency preparedness and response, among others.

“JEE is an essential tool that providing unbiased and comprehensive assessment of the nation’s ability to prevent, detect, and respond to health threats.

“It evaluates various aspects of our health system, ranging from surveillance and laboratory systems to emergency response and risk communication.

“The process allows us to identify our strengths and pinpoint areas that demand further attention and improvement,” he said.

Dr Patrick Nguku, Regional Technical Coordinator, African Field Epidemiology Network (AFENET), said the country established a robust disease surveillance system to detect, prevent and respond to disease outbreaks promptly.

Nguku, who is also a Senior Resident Advisor at Nigeria Field Epidemiology and Laboratory Training Programmes, said that these included monitoring diseases at the community level, strengthening laboratory capacity and improving data collection and reporting.

“The Nigerian Government has developed emergency preparedness plans and response strategies to address health emergencies effectively.

“This involves training healthcare workers, establishing emergency response teams, and stockpiling essential medical supplies.

“COVID-19 was an experience which laid bare the gaps in the country’s national health security, even where the scores were good.

“The JEE will provide the opportunity for the country to go back to the drawing board,”he said

According to Dr Farrah Hussein, the representative of the United States Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (USCDC), a lot has happened since the last JEE and this came alongside several lessons learnt.

Hussein said that USCDC looked forward to incorporating those lessons in JEE to enable the country to be better prepared for any future public health emergencies as a country.

“The Emergency Preparedness and Response, WHO, Dr Mie Okamura, said since the establishment of JEE as one of the International Health Regulations (IHR) tjat monitored and evaluated frameworks, WHO had remained committed to supporting its implementation across countries, including Nigeria.”

Dr Michael Olugbile, Senior Health Specialist, World Bank, said that the World Bank is very pleased to see the progress that had been made so far within the country.

Olugbile said after the JEE, the World Bank will look forward to seeing how far the country had come in its national health security, identifying gaps and making recommendations to address challenges.

Dr Olusola Aruna, representative, UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), said the agency has been part of the journey since the country’s JEE in 2017.

“We implore colleagues to be objective in all our deliberations as we work together to assess our core capacities.”

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that following Nigeria’s maiden JEE in June 2017, utilising the JEE 1.0 tool and yielding a 39 per cent score, the nation seized significant strides to bolster its public health security legal framework.

This proactive approach engendered the formulation and implementation of crucial legislations, including the NCDC Act of 2018, which established a functional IHR National Focal Point (NFP).

The Animal Disease (Control) Act of 2022, aimed at deftly managing and thwarting the spread of contagious, infectious, and zoonotic diseases.

Concomitantly, these measures accentuated health security coordination and funding across the country.

Moreover, legislative interventions like the recently passed Public Health Emergency Bill, intended to ensure the full implementation of IHR obligations, and the Ports Health Service Bill 2022, which aims to regulate health security matters at points of entry, await presidential assent.

In adherence to the conventional requirement set forth by the World Health Assembly (WHA) for countries to conduct JEE evaluations every five years, Nigeria is poised for yet another JEE assessment.

As an integral part of this evaluation, a self-assessment of the nation’s capacity to preempt, detect, and respond to public health threats of significance is underway.

The self-evaluation phase, scheduled from July 24 to 28, 2023, is complemented by an external evaluation conducted by expert teams, scheduled for August 14 to 18, 2023.

Following the self-assessment phase, an external expert JEE team will validate the self-assessment scores through comprehensive and interactive sessions, paving the way for further development of a national action plan.(NAN)