These workshops entitled, From Global Strategy to National Action, developed for health service managers in charge of leprosy control programmes, are an attempt by the World Health Organization and its partners, including ILEP, to ensure that communities will continue to have access to quality leprosy services even in low endemic countries.

The manuals for both participants and facilitators have been developed by the WHO in close collaboration with ILEP. (View these manuals at http://www.ilep.org.uk/library-resources/who-publications/). The workshops enable managers of integrated programmes to implement the WHO’s leprosy control strategy in their countries based on informed decisions.  The managers targeted are those with responsibility for leprosy control but for whom leprosy is only a part of their responsibility or who have little leprosy background and time to attend long leprosy training schedules.

Following a pilot workshop at ALERT, Ethiopia, in December 2007, further workshops are being carried out during 2008 and 2009. Two have already been held in Trinidad, April 2008 (for the PAHO region) and at ALERT in Ethiopia, May 2008 (for the AFRO region). Further workshops are planned to take place in Dhaka, Bangladesh, (September) and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, (November) in 2008 for both the SEARO and WPRO regions. (View listing of training courses at http://www.ilep.org.uk/technical-advice/training/). 

The workshops, with their mix of innovative training methods and hands-on training, have been extremely well received by national programme managers and it is hoped that similar adapted workshops can be held at country and provincial levels.  The development of the training manuals and the rolling out of these workshops is an encouraging indicator of the increasingly important and successful collaboration between WHO and ILEP.

Categories: International Collaboration