Welcome Interstate Managers

Sometimes it takes more than a board of directors to ensure an agency or government is safeguarding our interests. This is particularly true in regulation.  While a country's best interests may not align with international agenda, regulation on behalf of safety and protection is almost always universal. Workarounds to regulation, often allowed of out of self interest or cost, should be tied to international repercussions.  Regulation of food, markets, environmental epidemiology and other early prevention in novel strains make a difference.  Upcoming pandemics and outbreaks can be avoided, or at least better addressed, with better regulation. The international community should gather several policy points, measures and international comparisons. The international health community should observe, encourage and report on countries with and without these policies.  The end of the year COVID-19 WHO report is dynamic and impressive. It is missing policy development and in...

Emergency Medical Team partnerships have been impressive and we should be grateful for international collegiality. The training and development for COVID response can be applied to future infection control during individual transport, outbreaks and other emergencies.    How can we show gratitude as a global group? We can be at the table to help EMT response flow. *Meet, survey and collect information on logistical needs for EMT sustainability in these countries.  *Ask if logistics liaisons for operations coordination would be of use.   *Determine funding needs, policy alignment abilities and credentialing alignment potentials, worldwide. Assertively confront the acronym and credentialing discrepancies. Be direct about the difference in EMT, Technician versus Team . Resolve, fund and manage to move forward together.  *Consider first response systems worldwide, including dispatch and policing networks. Consider separate jurisdiction wherever corruption may fr...

Continued pandemic management requires improved operations for forcibly displaced persons, migrants and refugees. Better organization for this population will expedite prevention and treatment for people, assist host countries and help prepare for future outbreaks. Organization for refugees, migrants and forcibly displaced persons should include:  * International oversight      R ecommendations and monetary awards for countries managing these populations should be supported with global analyses and follow up   .    Cohesive action should be driven by formal global planning, with experts at the table.    Real time analysis of host country needs and resources for the refugee and forcibly displaced population. If we are aware of the basics, we can improve real time analytics.  * Accountability    World Health Organization situational reports shape questions of accountability to epidemiological and surveillance improvements. E...

  While much of the COVID-19 pandemic response is the navigation of new global coordination, much of the response has also been a result of poor expertise continuity. This is particularly true for countries with decades of funded emergency preparedness structure, and particularly true of the United States.  Many in leadership have not handed off continuity of expertise, nor accepted the hand off, well. Continued reinvention of the wheel has left resources depleted and depreciated. As mass vaccination begins, it is unclear what planning, consideration and reach has extended from our previous work in H1N1. It is unclear how much will be learned for the first time, and by how many, for lessons that could have been previously shared. It is also unclear what national, state and local efforts, funded for decades, are now at the table.  The energy dedicated to recreating the wheel continuously cannot be entirely avoided, particularly with lapses in continuity and quality to oper...

Pandemic management has not stepped up for the public's bereavement needs.  The structure led by world health is focused on infectious disease points; epidemiology, disease management, mitigation, immunization and therapeutics. There remains a lack of global  psychological and social structure around the COVID pandemic. National pandemic response has failed to address real-time grief and bereavement throughout the pandemic. National and international strategies for bereavement funding, staffing and operations at the public health level are not communicated, and likely do not exist.  Grief and bereavement response can and should be addressed globally. For this COVID pandemic, and for a future pandemic that may happen at any moment, grief and bereavement structure should be initiated now. *Grief and bereavement epidemiology should be clear and standard. Here is a helpful indicator, the methodology behind it, and potential application for numbers projections without reliance...

Global health planning for ongoing and future pandemics will require continued evaluation of condensed data aggregation. We want to be selective and smart about what we badger about. The current indicators tell a global story, and one of the main narratives is that of the data not available. 50% of countries do not have data on whether or not they have infection prevention in long term care, 67% of countries have no data on whether or not they have occupational health for workers, 45% of countries have no data on whether or not they have national IPC programs and WASH standards, and so forth. There's a lot that we have no data on, a lot that individual countries have no data about themselves on. Let's improve.  Let's badger about obtaining the basics of the listed indicators, funding to obtain and be accountable to these indicators, and alignment of details of the indicators.  As a global group: We should shoulder burden. Countries with indicator ease should shoulder some b...