BOPDHB Checkup May 2017 | Page 11

Assisting the World Health Organization in its efforts to fight infectious disease Ensuring infectious disease front-line responders across the globe can access online training from the world’s experts was all part of a day’s work recently for one member of staff. Anna-Marie Schopp, Public Health Development Advisor at Toi Te Ora – Public Health Service, recently spent three weeks working on contract for the World Health Organization (WHO) based at their head offices in Geneva, Switzerland. Anna-Marie recently spent three weeks at the WHO developing online training modules on infectious diseases for front-line workers. Having worked for the WHO previously, Anna-Marie was asked to help prepare online training modules for a three day infectious diseases workshop in Dakar, Senegal. The workshop covered how to prepare, plan and respond to infectious diseases that pose significant public health challenges and that are emerging, remerging or spreading geographically due to climate change or conflicts. The development of the online training modules included a video presentation from the world experts on managing outbreaks of diseases such as Rift Valley fever, Lassa fever and avian influenza. “A significant highlight of my time at the WHO was working with their experts. They had so much enthusiasm and passion for their particular subjects, and I learnt a lot from them about different diseases and disease threats,” says Anna-Marie. The online training modules can be viewed on OpenWHO at https://openwho.org OpenWHO is a new interactive, web-based, knowledge-transfer platform offering online courses to improve the response to health emergencies. This enables the WHO and its key partners to transfer life-saving knowledge to large numbers of frontline responders. A statue at the WHO headquarters which was erected in 2010 to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the eradication of smallpox. December 2016 6 er 201 Octob Contribute to Checkup p Checku Plenty Bay of Distric h t Healt Board ws staff ne C heckup Checku Bay of Plenty Health Board staff news Bay of Plenty District Distric t Healt h Board staff ne ws p March 2017 If you would like to contribute articles to Checkup, or want to suggest a story, email Communications Advisor Stephanie Byers via [email protected] g our Creatin page 9 – culture l first: Hospita es celebrat – page 4 s succes swing BOPDHB n for tio into ac unami mock Ts loser 23 – page Biggest winner – page 4 1 Join the Feeling festive – page 12-13 Get rea our dy to Creating SWEA T – culture back in pag Feb – page 6 e 3 Flu Fighte rs What Ca n I do Next? Creatin g is a Mo our Culture vement … – pag e 11 – page 4 Happy Fe cover 10 et to 36 hours 0ks in – page 17 1 11