In line with the commitment of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US CDC) to provide high level technical support to Liberian public health systems, the US CDC is collaborating with the African Field Epidemiology Network (AFENET) to design and implement a US Government-tailored Public Health Intensive Course (USG PHI) to increase and strengthen the capacity of its locally employed staff. This opportunity for capacity-building was extended to other US Government organizations by the US CDC.
The objectives of the USG PHI are to strengthen the capacity of USG’s locally-employed staff skills in epidemiology, disease and laboratory surveillance, outbreak investigation and response, data quality management and analysis, public health communication, emergency preparedness, and response. The course will be implemented over nine months, reflecting some aspects of the in-service-based training approach within the conventional Field Epidemiology Training Programs.
The training was launched by US CDC on March 27, 2023 with the first one-week in-class module (Module 1) with a cohort of four participants – three from the US CDC and one from USAID. Two members of the cohort are Monitoring and Evaluation specialists, one Infection Prevention Control (IPC) specialist, and one Laboratory Specialist. Lessons in Module 1 focused on basic principles in Epidemiology and Surveillance. Facilitators were from AFENET Liberia and US CDC Liberia and Atlanta.