The first strand of ReBUILD for Resilience’s research focused on four COVID-19 related projects. They were funded through our Responsive Fund – a flexible way for all partners and associate partners to access funds to support responsive activities.
Partners: Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, HERD International, American University of Beirut, Burnet Institute Myanmar and COMAHS
COVID-19 is has markedly affected our FASP study settings of Lebanon, Nepal, Myanmar and Sierra Leone. Close-to-community (CTC) providers are part of the response to the pandemic in these settings. However, there are evidence gaps, including how policy and practice (eg support structures) have adapted to the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the CTC providers’ experiences during the pandemic and how these are gendered.
This study explored the roles of CTC health care providers and their gendered experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic FASP settings. We conducted document reviews, interviews with CTC providers and key informants in Lebanon, Nepal, Myanmar and Sierra Leone.
This study contributes evidence on gender equitable approaches to supporting CTC providers in FASP contexts to fulfil their vital roles in the COVID-19 response and future disease outbreaks and shocks.
Partners: Queen Margaret University and International Rescue Committee
During epidemics women and girls often experience reduced access to non-outbreak related sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services. For example, during the West Africa Ebola outbreak, excess maternal and neonatal deaths exceeded the number of deaths from Ebola, and the current COVID-19 pandemic might have similar effects. While guidance and tools to adapt SRH protocols and programmes to emergencies exist, often SRH services targeting women are dismissed as non-essential despite the mortality risks.
This study examined decision-making dynamics around adaptations to the Minimum Initial Service Package for Reproductive Health in Emergencies in North Kivu in the context of COVID-19. It examined relationships across local civil society organisations, international non-governmental organisations, Health Cluster, UN agencies, national/subnational government, the private sector, and international donors with a view to understanding the politics of SRH service adaptation during an outbreak, what (or who) drives willingness to innovate and adapt, and if possible, what are the repercussions of doing so or not.
Partners: HERD International, Queen Margaret University and Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine
This study examined health sector policy, preparedness and responses to COVID-19 in Nepal, focusing on policies, provisions and implementation approaches for health workforce management at the sub-national level. It explored Nepal’s health system resilience and the lessons learnt from its COVID-19 response, and aimed to understand if and how it demonstrated absorption, adaptation and transformation to support resilient health system.
The study focused on understanding the health workforce management system in this federalised context as a tracer for the wider health system, at the local level for COVID-19 response and in the delivery of non-COVID routine health services. This will help us develop a framework for future research in health workforce management.
Partners: Burnet Institute Myanmar and Queen Margaret University
This study aimed to understand the lived experiences of linked communities and primary care-level health workers in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and to contribute to the resilience of the health system in responding to COVID-19.
Insein was chosen because of its high COVID-19 caseload and its response in the early phase of the pandemic (eg the closure of a private hospital and high transmission via close community gatherings).