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. 2025 Sep 4:13:1444354.
doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1444354. eCollection 2025.

The Africa Centres for Disease Control public health emergency management fellowship: insights from the inaugural cohort

Mesfin Wossen Getaneh  1   2 , Albert Pascal  1   3 , Rejoice Kudirat Luka-Lawal  1   4 , Martin Kukenzikila Kutubana  1   5 , Joseph Anderson Bunting-Graden  1   6 , Esmeraldo Tiago Camboneia Ezembro  1   7 , Soransora D Tadicha  1   8 , Paulin N Essone  1   9 , Simon Magodi  1 , Uchenna Anebonam  1 , Wessam Mankoula  1 , Womi Eteng Oboma  1
Affiliations

The Africa Centres for Disease Control public health emergency management fellowship: insights from the inaugural cohort

Mesfin Wossen Getaneh et al. Front Public Health. .

Abstract

Public health emergencies remain a significant challenge across the African continent, driven largely by the high burden of infectious diseases and constraints in the public health workforce. The Africa Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) has taken a strategic move towards addressing emergency preparedness and response workforce gap with the implementation of the Public Health Emergency Essone Management (PHEM) Fellowship aimed at providing African Union Member States (MS) with trained personnel in emergency management. We describe the components of this program comprised of six sections such as the advisory committee (from several countries and divers organizations), a rigorous selection process, eleven weeks of in-person classes with validated materials, field deployments in countries with ongoing emergency crises, projects and mentorship programs. The PHEM fellowship offers African countries a strategic opportunity to strengthen their public health workforce and enhance their preparedness towards potential public health emergencies.

Keywords: emergency preparedness and response; fellowship; health security; public health emergency management; public health emergency operations centre; workforce.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
First cohort of AfricaCDC PHEM fellowship program coverage.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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