Highlights of the IANPHI Executive Board Meeting
The IANPHI Executive Board (EB) held a virtual meeting on February 23, 2021. IANPHI President Duncan Selbie welcomed board members and particularly the members newly elected, as well as the chairs and vice-chairs of the IANPHI Regional Networks, the representatives of the IANPHI Foundation, the IANPHI Secretariat, and guests of IANPHI's member national public health institutes (NPHI) from Colombia’s Instituto Nacional de Salud, Public Health England, the German Robert Koch Institute, the Norwegian Institute of Public Health and the Saudi National Centre for Disease Control. The quorum to vote on the decisions was reached with seven members in attendance, out of 14, additional to two proxies.
1. IANPHI Treasurer Elections
As Prof. Duncan Selbie was elected president of IANPHI by the general assembly last December, the Association is looking for a new treasurer. Therefore, the IANPHI Executive Board members were invited to respond to the call for applications, sent by the IANPHI Secretariat.
2. Future of the IANPHI Foundation
There are currently two available positions within the IANPHI Foundation’s board of trustees. Therefore, the IANPHI EB members were invited to respond to the call for applications, which will be sent by the IANPHI Secretariat.
In the coming months, the new elected board of trustees will prepare a roadmap to close the foundation, jointly with the IANPHI President and the treasurer.
3. IANPHI Strategic Vision
The IANPHI Strategic Vision's first draft was submitted to the General Assembly in December 2020, during which the IANPHI Members discussed their views on the document. In January 2021 the IANPHI Secretariat collected further comments from the working group and from the global network. All comments were integrated in a second draft to be circulated among the working group, EB members and partners. The IANPHI Strategic Vision is to be published by April 2021.
A further working group will then be set up to draft the Action Plan, which will allow to achieve the Strategic Vision.
4. IANPHI Communication Strategy
Over the past year, the IANPHI U.S. Office communications team has worked to improve the IANPHI communications platforms, by re-designing the IANPHI website, revising the IANPHI Insider newsletter and creating a discussion group between member NPHIs’ communications professionals. This work has been fruitful: the number of engagements with IANPHI content was multiplied by 2,5.
In this perspective, IANPHI's communications director Andisheh Nourae presented the current communications strategy, which is divided into two pillars:
1) Best practices, and
2) Building community and demonstrating IANPHI effectiveness through communications.
5. Partnership with the World Health Organization
Delegations from IANPHI and the World Health Organization (WHO) met in February 2021 and launched the process to formalize their partnership. A working group composed by representatives of both IANPHI and WHO was formed, with a view to work jointly drafting the next steps of the relationship.
6. Ongoing IANPHI Projects
The joint working group formed by the Agency for Public Health Education Accreditation (APHEA) and IANPHI launched a survey to understand how IANPHI members strengthen their organizations and to identify the capacity gaps in public health professional training. The next stage will be to analysize the responses and draft a report and the proposal of a one-to-two-year plan.
An IANPHI working group dedicated to public health and climate change was created to develop a position paper showcasing the role of NPHIs in climate change policies and, more broadly, integrating public health issues in climate change adaptation and mitigation. The working group will also apply through a call for proposals to host a side event at the UN Climate Change Conference COP26.
The senior advisor for health security at the Global Fund expressed interest in learning more about IANPHI’s perspective on the current global health architecture, to identify strengths and limitations, needs and gaps, as well as opportunities for improvement, in the country-level governance for epidemic preparedness and response. The IANPHI Executive Board members were invited to inform the IANPHI U.S. Office if they are interested in taking part in the project.
This online version of the IANPHI Executive Board meeting report reflects actions taken at the most recent meeting of the IANPHI Executive Board and is provided for the convenience of IANPHI members. This online document is not the official, complete record of the actions of the IANPHI Executive Board, it is merely a summary of actions taken. The IANPHI Executive Board’s official minutes, in their entirety, are on file with the IANPHI Secretariat. Should you have any questions about this online summary of the agenda, actions taken, or the minutes of the meetings of the IANPHI Executive Board, please contact the IANPHI Secretariat at secretariat@ianphi.org.