WHO Guidance for Contingency Planning
Overview
The goal of the WHO Health Emergencies Programme is to help countries and to coordinate international action to prevent, prepare for, detect, rapidly respond to, and recover from outbreaks and emergencies in order to reduce the mortality and morbidity of affected populations.
This includes WHO’s own capacity to manage risks and respond to emergencies in a timely, predictable and effective manner. Headquarters, regional and country offices all need to plan, well ahead of a crisis, for the appropriate resources, systems, policies, procedures and capacities to undertake effective risk mitigation and response operations in support of, and in collaboration with, ministries of health and other partners.
Understanding the risk that threatens people’s health, planning to mitigate the impact, and preparing to respond can significantly save lives and preserve health and well-being. Thus all WHO offices need to undertake, along with governments, other UN agencies and partners, or alone if needed, regular strategic risk analysis and monitoring, and related contingency planning. In this contingency planning guidance, a set of actions to prepare for emergencies from all hazards and to help minimize their impact, is proposed. These actions include the development, implementation, simulation, monitoring and regular update of risks-based contingency plans.
This guidance is based on a common organizational approach and procedures for risks management and emergency response across all hazards and at every level of the Organization. It encompasses WHO’s responsibilities under the International Health Regulations (2005) and other international treaties, as the United Nations’ lead agency for health and the health cluster, and as a member of the United Nations or humanitarian country teams. The guidance has therefore been developed in line with the WHO corporate risk management framework and the WHO readiness checklist, as well as the Inter-Agency Emergency Response Preparedness Framework and its Contingency Plan Guidance.
