JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Public health has a pivotal role in strengthening resilience at the individual, community, and system levels, and in building resilient and healthy communities. The resilience of public health in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) varies from country to country mostly based on the governmental and financial situation of the countries. With the theme “Towards Public Health Resilience in the EMR: Breaking Barriers”, the Seventh Eastern Mediterranean Public Health Network (EMPHNET) regional conference, held on November 14-18, 2021, was dedicated to exploring ways for achieving public health resilience. A total of 101 oral presentations and 13 poster presentations were presented, which focused on subject areas of COVID-19, public health surveillance, zoonotic diseases, vaccine-preventable diseases, non-communicable diseases, vector-borne diseases, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS, Maternal and Child Health, and other areas of public health. Moreover, the conference included six keynote sessions, ten roundtable sessions, and five pre-conference workshops. The pre-conference workshops were conducted on important public health topics, including border health approaches to mitigate cross-border communicable disease spread; mobilization of FETPs and Rapid Responders in EMR countries; continuous professional development for public health workforce; brucellosis surveillance, diagnosis, and control using “One Health” approach; and identifying barriers and strategies to integrate and utilize NCDs data sources. The roundtable sessions included discussions on the topics including: the role of FETPs in responding to COVID-19; institutionalization of rapid response to public health emergencies in the EMR countries; health systems resilience; integration of early warning and response with event-based and indicator-based surveillance; sustaining International Health Regulations – enhancing multisectoral coordination in the face of conflict; strengthening the “One Health” approach; the anticipated future of public health in the post COVID-19 era; supporting public health research capacity, quality, and productivity in a diverse region; COVID-19 vaccines and routine immunization synergies and drawbacks; monitoring and combating waterpipe tobacco smoking through taxation and the global tobacco surveillance system. The keynote speakers sessions covered topics onessential public health functions (EPHFs) and the universal health coverage (UHC) challenge in the Eastern Mediterranean Region; lessons from the US coronavirus disease public health response; learning from COVID; re-shaping public health post pandemic era; COVID-19 resilient primary health care: and the cohesion of society during and after a pandemic. The conference sessions brought highly promising opportunities to explore ways to achieve such goals in the EMR and shed light on the latest scientific findings, important lessons learned, and discussions on ways in which current barriers can be broken down through coordination and collaboration.