EpiCourse second edition group photo
This year, the course welcomed 20 attendees from 13 countries, with the aim of boosting the knowledge and skills of these French-speaking epidemiologists working in human, animal, and environmental health. By the end of the course, the specialists had gained additional insights to help them provide an international, multidisciplinary response to complex emergency situations, such as transmissible disease epidemics and natural disasters.
Led by Prof. Vanhems, Director of Public Health Programs at the Mérieux Foundation, and Dr. Cohuet of Epiconcept, EpiCourse underlines the importance of surveillance and the associated alert systems, and of analyzing and managing the response to epidemics in complex emergency situations in order to control emergent and re-emergent infectious diseases.
The course emphasized an interdisciplinary approach, crisis communications, and research as essential factors in the context of a complex emergency. The course participants attended lectures, talked about the course material in round-table discussions, and, in a new addition to the course this year, examined several case studies. In particular, they were able to practice spatial sampling techniques to estimate the size of a population and collect data directly from the park at the Les Pensières center using the modern technologies provided.
The participants working on the simulation game
They also received support to complete a simulation game called “Outbreak Ready 2: Thisland in Crisis”, developed by Ready Initiative. During this exercise, participants took on the role of a health program manager working for a humanitarian NGO responsible for identifying, assessing, and interpreting data in order to plan and implement an integrated response to an epidemic.
The week-long program was developed by a scientific committee consisting of representatives of the following institutions: Epiconcept, the Mérieux Foundation, Hospices Civils de Lyon, CEPI, GAVI, Institut Pasteur, WHO, WAHO, and Nazi Boni University.