WHO and the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC)
In order to keep health action in crises high on the inter-agency humanitarian agenda, WHO actively participates in IASC events. As Global Health Cluster Lead Agency, WHO has opportunity to represent the views of the Health cluster partners and to keep partners informed. The IASC Working Group will meet in New York, 7-9 April.
The Global Health Cluster Secretariat has, in recent months, doubled its ways of communication with partners. The website and the regular emails have been complemented by Facebook and Twitter updates.
Sub-National Health Cluster Coordination in Haiti - report from Save the Children
The challenges to coordination of the humanitarian health response in the Haiti following the 12 January 2010 earthquake were immense not only at the national level but also at the sub-national level. Save the Children coordinated the sub-national health clusters in Leogane and Jacmel for the first two months following the earthquake.
Workshop on promoting and using the GHC developed tools and core health indicators, Nairobi 19-20 November 2009
The Promoting and using in humanitarian crisis the Global Health Cluster proposed core health indicators and related tools for data collection and analysis, participatory workshop was held in Nairobi on 19-20 November 2009.
The co-chairs for the Global Health Cluster Working Group and the Policy and Strategy Team met in Geneva in February, to align the work of the two groups and to monitor the progress of the GHC work plan 2010.
The GHC Policy and Strategy Team met 10-11 February, 2010, in Geneva to finalize the first GHC position paper on User Fees, to discuss the way forward for the piloting of the GHC developed tools at country level and to jump start work on the position paper on Civil/Military Coordination.
Tool for monitoring the implementation of the Health Cluster
The implementation of the Health Cluster in countries is a complex process. It is not only about establishing a consistent mechanism but aims to implement and to fulfil the functions indicated in the Health Cluster Guide and in the Guidance Note on using the Cluster Approach to strengthen Humanitarian Response from the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC).
The position papers developed by the GHC Policy and Strategy team aim to provide guidance to policy makers and other health actors in humanitarian crises. The first GHC position paper 'User Fees in Humanitarian Situations' was finalized in the beginning of March, 2010 and the development of a second paper exploring 'Civil Military Cooperation' has begun.
Global Health Cluster Nairobi meeting final report
Over 60 Global Health Cluster partners met in Nairobi 16-18 November, 2009, to review global and country health cluster work in 2009 and to develop a draft Global Health Cluster work plan for 2010.
As of March 2010 the Global Health Cluster consists of 38 partners. If your organization would like to become a member of the Global Health Cluster, contact the GHC Secretariat for more information.
If you have any comments on the content of the newsletter or would like to write an article for the next edition, please contact the GHC secretariat healthlcluster@who.int. Next issue is scheduled for 1 July 2010.
