Framing the future of the COVID-19 response operations in 2022 in the WHO African region

ABSTRACT

Background

With the evolving epidemiological parameters of COVID-19 in Africa, the response actions and lessons learnt during the pandemic’s past two years, SARS-COV 2 will certainly continue to circulate in African countries in 2022 and beyond. As countries in the African continent need to be more prepared and plan to ‘live with the virus’ for the upcoming two years and after and at the same time mitigate risks by protecting the future most vulnerable and those responsible for maintaining essential services, WHO AFRO is anticipating four interim scenarios of the evolution of the pandemic in 2022 and beyond in the region.

Objective

In preparation for the rollout of response actions given the predicted scenarios, WHO AFRO has identified ten strategic orientations and areas of focus for supporting member states and partners in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic in Africa in 2022 and beyond.

Methods

WHO analysed trends of the transmissions since the first case in the African continent and reviewed lessons learnt over the past months.

Results

Establishing a core and agile team solely dedicated to the COVID-19 response at the WHO AFRO, the emergency hubs, and WCOs will improve the effectiveness of the response and address identified challenges. The team will collaborate with the various clusters of the regional office, and other units and subunits in the WCOs supported with good epidemics intelligence. COVID-19 pandemic has afflicted global humanity at unprecedented levels.

Conclusion

Two years later and while starting the third year of the COVID-19 response, we now need to change and adapt our strategies, tools and approaches in responding timely and effectively to the pandemic in Africa and save more lives.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• response
• operations
• WHO African region

Responsible Editor

Stig Wall

Responsible Editor

Stig Wall

Acknowledgment

The authors acknowledge the contributions, comments and reviews of the WHO AFRO COVID-19 IMST pillar and sub-pillar leads, hub leads, and COVID-19 IMs in countries that enriched the document with additional relevant dimensions and elements of the COVID-19 response in Africa for 2022 and beyond.

Author’s contribution

TB and ASG conceptualised the comment/position paper; BO drafted the initial manuscript, and HK conducted the analysis, which was subsequently revised for important intellectual content by all authors. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Paper context

The paper positions the countries in Africa to be more prepared and plan to ‘live with the COVID-19 virus.’ The evolution of the pandemic in 2022 and beyond in the region envisages scenarios to guide response actions. There is a need to mitigate risks by protecting the most vulnerable and those responsible for maintaining essential services. Additionally, it is imperative to change and adapt our strategies, tools and approaches in responding timely and effectively to the pandemic in Africa and save more lives.

Notes

¹ Pooled estimates are based on national, sub-national and local studies from available countries (8 studies in 6 countries in September 2021).

² Estimates provided from an ongoing modelling exercise by the WHO regional office for Africa data analytics teams.

³ Kwazulu-Natal Research Innovation and Sequencing Platform (KRISP), African Center of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases (ACEGID), South African National Bioinformatics Institute (SANBI), National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), Kenya Medical research Institute (KEMRI), Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI), Institut Pasteur Dakar (IPD), Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR), Institut National pour la Recherche Biomedicale (INRB), Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and Centre International de Recherches Medicales de Franceville in Gabon (CIRMF).

⁴ Burundi, Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, DRC, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Senegal, Zambia.

⁵ Detailed discussion on the Joint Statement on Dose Donations of COVID-19 Vaccines to African Countries is found here: https://www.who.int/news/item/29-11-2021-joint-statement-on-dose-donations-of-covid-19-vaccines-to-african-countries.

⁶ Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guinea, Kenya, Mali, Niger, Nigeria and South Africa.

Additional information

Funding

The paper was developed as part of the ongoing contextualisation of the COVID-19 response to the different WHO regions. It has been done with the support of the WHO Regional Office for Africa.