Senior Epidemiologist

Job Description

GH-TAMS is seeking candidates for a Senior Epidemiologist for a six-month assignment with USAID/ Mozambique. The consultancy will be in country at 143 days of effort. Start date is approximately January 15, 2024.

Background:

As WHO declared the end of COVID-19 as a global health emergency (in May 2023), the risk remains as new SARS-CoV-2 variants are emerging that potentially can cause a new surge in cases and deaths. In Mozambique, Ministry of Health is continuing efforts to detect COVID-19 and to integrate the data into routine platforms for surveillance and reporting and standing-up COVID-19 sentinel surveillance, while also transitioning routine COVID-19 testing and surveillance reporting protocols into Mozambique´s regular Integrated Disease Surveillance and Response (IDSR) platform.

In addition, Mozambique was designated as an Intensive Support Country by the National Security Council, which led to a growth in Mission activities in the past two years. The Mission’s $8million portfolio of new Global Health Security Agenda activities is covered by a single technical advisor, who must split her time across multiple program areas and ministries.

While disease surveillance is an area that the Ministry of Health (MISAU) has been attempting to grow its capabilities in, it lacks an adequate number of experienced epidemiologists to carry forward its current strategies and plans. This capacity gap includes developing the National Disease Surveillance Strategic Plan, which will improve monitoring of key reportable diseases including COVID-19, to better prevent, detect and respond to outbreaks, and including the COVID-19 surveillance data into the routine IDSR.
The Senior Epidemiologist will be seconded to the Ministry of Health and enhance the capacity of the National Surveillance Department under National Department of Public Health (DNSP) and work to detect events of significance for public health and health security according to International Health Regulations (IHR).

• Coordinate the development of the National Disease Surveillance Strategic Plan with other stakeholders.
• Establish routine data reporting flows to manage priority diseases data, including COVID-19, data reported from community, public or private health facilities, and sentinel surveillance platforms.
• Provide technical support to the National Surveillance Department Director to lead activities in the department.
• Provide technical assistance, guidance and support on data management “best practices” for various Microsoft Office, commercial COVID-19-specific data platforms, and DHIS2-based platforms where surveillance and outbreak response data are managed.
• Develop and assist with the implementation of the National Surveillance Department annual operational plan and provide technical assistance to monitor and evaluate progress.
• Coordinate surveillance data (including COVID-19) mapping, collecting, reviewing, and archiving of health and health related data.
• Develop a capacity building/training plan and provide regular training on the disease surveillance system to the multidisciplinary staff at the DNSP and to Surveillance Officers at the national, provincial and district levels.
• Develop surveillance data quality monitoring/assessment (DQA) tools.
• Assist DNSP with establishing the Surveillance Pillar under the newly established National Public Health Emergency Operation Center (NPHEOC)
• Write manuscripts, technical reports, policy briefs, situational reports, as needed.
• Network with other line ministries assisting with integrating animal health surveillance systems under the NPHEOC.
• Provide capacity to enhance national and intermediate level data analysis and facilitate surveillance data evidence translation to decisions to coordinate the preparedness, detection, and response to infectious disease outbreaks, and public health emergencies.
• Develop epidemiological bulletins and share surveillance data across sectors, as required by IHR.
• Support other DNSP activities, as needed.

Qualifications:

• PhD in Epidemiology with 10 years demonstrated experience in strengthening public health surveillance systems.
• Ability to coordinate Surveillance/Epidemiologic units/departments, data managers, and data analytics.
• Ability to conceptualize, devise, and lead the national epidemiological/surveillance strategy.
• Demonstrated ability in advanced Epidemiology and quantitative science.
• Demonstrated experience in disease epidemiology of Mozambique’s priority and health risk factors.
• Strong skills in statistical software such as Stata, SPSS or R, dashboards, Power BI etc.
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
• Demonstrated ability to work within different contexts.
• Excellent ability to work in a multidisciplinary team environment.
• Fluent in English; Portuguese language is preferred, but not essential

About the Organization

International Business & Technical Consultants, Inc. (IBTCI), is the prime contractor implementing the $125 million USAID-funded Global Health Technical Assistance and Mission Support Project (GH-TAMS) activity. Along with its subcontractor, Dexis Consulting Group (Dexis), IBTCI provides the Bureau for Global Health (GH) and USAID field missions with high quality technical expertise to achieve the Agency's foreign assistance global health mission (October 2019-October 2024). GH-TAMS technical assistance supports over 65 Missions and 19 GH Offices and other Bureaus covering a broad range of technical areas and cross-cutting issues such as HIV/AIDS, family planning, MNCH, infectious disease, TB, health finance, reproductive health, organizational development, OVC, project design, facilitation, M&E and strategic planning.

Project assignments are located in Washington D.C. and worldwide in Africa, Asia and elsewhere. Assignments typically range from two weeks to six months in duration.