Directorate of Disease Prevention and Control in Ministry of Health and Sanitation with assistance from the WHO and CDC conducted a two day workshop to develop a national surveil-lance, preparedness and response strategic plan for Sierra Leone. This is the first consensus building workshops and was attended by Directors, hospital and programme Managers, laboratory technicians, medical officers and health sector partners.

In his opening remarks, Dr Amara Jambai Director DPC stated that the strategic plan will serve as a guide to surveillance and outbreak response activities in the country. Expected outcome of the strategy include: linking laboratory services to surveil-lance framework, harmonization and streamlining of flow of in-formation and coordination of stakeholders. The draft Strategy will be discussed in subsequent workshops for further consulta-tion and validation.

The plan is in line with priorities of the MoHS, and the WHO Country Cooperation Strategy (CCS) 2008-2013. The CCS em-phasizes support for effective disease surveillance, epidemic pre-paredness and outbreak response including implementation of the International Health Regulations (IHR 2005). The Strategic Plan will serve as the tool for strengthening national capacity for early warning, detection and appropriate response to disease out-breaks in the country.

For More Information contact:

World Health Organization, 21 A and B Riverside Drive, off King Harman Road, Freetown
Phone : 232-22-233565 , +232-76-723236; e-mail: whosl [at] sl.afro.who.int,
Website www.whosierraleone.org