This interim guidance addresses specific needs and considerations required in humanitarian situations, including camps and camp-like settings and the surrounding host communities, in scaling-up readiness and response operations for the COVID-19 outbreak through effective multi-sectoral partnership. This is intended for field coordinators, camp managers, and public health personnel, as well as national and local governments and the wider humanitarian community working in humanitarian situations.

Abstract

IOM’s health response to humanitarian and public health emergencies aims to save lives, reduce morbidity and alleviate suffering while upholding humanitarian principles and protecting human dignity. IOM’s programming in this domain encompasses the various stages and typologies of emergencies, throughout all the phases of the mobility continuum. 

IOM’s health response to humanitarian and public health emergencies aims to save lives, reduce morbidity and alleviate suffering while upholding humanitarian principles and protect human dignity. IOM’s programming in this domain encompasses the various stages and typologies of emergencies, throughout all the phases of the mobility continuum. 

With migration being a determinant of health, IOM works to specifically aid the health of displaced populations. Hazardous traveling conditions, overcrowding, and limited access to proper hygiene and sanitation can increase a migrant’s vulnerability to disease, particularly communicable diseases. Yet, displacement can also exacerbate the burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs). During displacement, the limited access to healthcare throughout travel can delay diagnosis or deplete medications.

IOM and CDC have worked together in seven countries: Ghana, Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Liberia, Mauritania, Senegal and Sierra Leone, addressing multiple GHSA action packages including Surveillance, Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs), Public Health and Law Enforcement, and Medical Countermeasures. The project focuses on strengthening surveillance, bilateral and regional coordination to implement the World Health Organization’s (WHO) 2005 International Health Regulations (IHR), as well as Point-Of-Entry (POE) capacity building to bring sea, air, and land entry points into compliance with IHR st

In partnership with the Government of Kenya, and at both national and local levels, the International Organization for Migration offers health care services for urban migrants directly through IOM’s health assessment programme, which fulfills the health requirements of countries receiving migrants. IOM and partners facilitate the Eastleigh Community Wellness Centre, a budding health clinic located in east Nairobi that meets the needs of migrants and their host community without discrimination. The centre, available for both Kenyans and migrants, offers friendly services,

•  Between April 22 and 29 2016, through its sub-office in N’Zerekore, IOM organized a series of field visits to meet with administrative and military authorities of Koyama, Kpaou, Zénié, Baala, Wolono. That aim of the visit was to inform the authorities about the set-up of health screening points at different border points of entry and introduce the health screening agents to be deployed at these border entry points. 

• Between May 9 and 13, IOM, in partnership with CDC, launched the first simulation exercise to manage EVD cases at the Madina Oula Point of Entry (PoE), at the border with Sierra Leone. Between May 22 and 26, it launched the second simulation exercise at the PoE of Baala, near Liberia. The main objective of these exercises is to prepare the authorities in charge of the points of entry in detecting, notifying and managing any suspected case of potential epidemic disease, especially EVD cases at their various borders.