Iraq: Iraq: Health Cluster Bulletin No. 4 - April 2019
Based on the quickly evolving flood situation in Missan, on 4th April, WHO/Health Cluster sent 30 basic IEHK kits to cover a population of 100,000 for one month in addition to one Trauma A & B Kit taking advantage of the Government approval to transport shipments.
The Health Cluster took the OCHA online survey on the feedback about the 2019 HRP process and the HPC Projects Module roll out. This was conducted in order to learn more on how OCHA could better support during the 2020 HRP process.
The Health Cluster team and MHPSS Working Group Lead gave an interview to a Master's candidate in Global Affairs from New York University for her thesis on the importance of contextualized and culturally appropriate MHPSS programming in humanitarian emergency settings.
As agreed in the ICCG meeting on 28 March, the National Protection and CCCM clusters conducted throughout April and into May, a series of workshops in 8 governorates across Iraq, titled ‘’Protection & Solutions for Vulnerable IDPs/Returnees’’. Before starting the workshops, the clusters provided a briefing/demonstration on the Kobo-based Rights Violation Tracking Matrix and Camp Incident Tracking Matrix (on militarization of camps) for the national cluster coordinators on 7 April.
The Iraqi returns from Syria Operational Plan document was developed in April. The Health Cluster requested USD 1,474,000 to provide Comprehensive Primary Health Care, referral services and medicines/emergency kits to 31,000 Iraqi returnees expected to cross the border into Iraq.
The Health Cluster attended the findings on the study on “Data Collection on Victims of Mines in Iraq” that was presented by Handicap International and Sarah Nijholt on 10th April.
The Health Cluster participated in the ICCG 2019 HRP Lessons Learnt Workshop, which was conducted by OCHA on 11 April, to review the 2019 HRP development and monitoring processes and draw lessons in order to inform 2020 HRP processes.
The Health Cluster along with Department of Health (DoH) Ninewah coordinated the support to Al Shuhada PHCC, Sinjar district, when 3 NGOs could not come to an agreement, assigning it to one NGO, keeping in line with the Iraq Health Cluster policy of one partner per location.
Between April 23rd to 25th, the Health Cluster Coordinator, Co-Lead and WHO GBV focal person participated in the GBV in Emergencies (GBViE) workshop held in Amman where focal people from countries in the EMRO region were present. This workshop was facilitated by WHO HQ and EMRO offices. The country workplan for trainings, capacity building and gender mainstreaming for the remainder of the year was developed during this workshop. In addition, Iraq was the first country to develop GBV Advocacy paper.
The WHO Consultant for Accountability to Affected Populations (AAP), visited Iraq between 13th – 19th April. Apart from meeting with WHO emergency staff, the purpose of the visit was as below:
1) Visit program areas to meet with operational staff and affected populations (health committee/other community groups/users for facilities) to get their perceptions on application of AAP
- Information sharing
- Influencing programming decisions
- System for feedback and action (health specific and multi-sector/collective)
2) Meet with other key stakeholders supporting collective AAP mechanisms.
- Information sharing
The Health Cluster SAG met on 17th April to discuss the below items:
1- SAG ToR revision to fit the requirements of the transition phase
2- HNO structure change – 2019/2020
3- Humanitarian Pooled Fund and the Consortium Approach
