Country Landscape and MTaPS’ Support

Côte d'Ivoire announced its first case of COVID-19 on March 11, 2020. The country used the experience of its National Operations Center for Public Health Emergencies during the 2013–2014 Ebola outbreak to start the COVID-19 response. However, the country needed priority assistance to handling the influx of COVID-19 patients in health facilities and train health workers on adequate infection prevention and control (IPC) measures. USAID MTaPS was tasked to support Côte d’Ivoire with its response to the COVID-19 pandemic to leverage its ongoing work in the country in multisectoral coordination and IPC to combat antimicrobial resistance (AMR) as part of its Global Health Security Agenda mandate. MTaPS helped form a national COVID-19 IPC working group as part of the multisectoral IPC technical committee established under its GHSA support. Starting out with developing a national COVID-19 IPC action plan and activating existing IPC committees at hospitals to conduct IPC assessments, the support took a systems strengthening approach to build the national IPC capacity.

Following the launch of the COVID-19 vaccination in the country, MTaPS is providing support to the Government of Côte d’Ivoire on supply chain and logistics management, IPC, injection safety, service delivery, and planning and coordination activities to ensure safe and efficient deployment of vaccines.

Select Highlights 

Infection Prevention and Control

Indicators as of September 2023

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3599

Number of health workers who received COVID-19-related training in IPC and WASH

652

Number of health facilities supported for IPC and/or WASH for COVID-19

Setting up a triage station at the CHR of Man. Photo credit: Ange Fulgence Ouffoue, MTaPS Côte d’Ivoire

Setting up a triage station at the CHR of Man. Photo credit: Ange Fulgence Ouffoue, MTaPS Côte d’Ivoire

  • Strengthened COVID-19 IPC compliance capacity in 39 hospitals, innovating and promoting the use of WHO Afro IPC scorecards for performance monitoring and using a supportive supervision approach—achieved 89% compliance (a 14% improvement) across 36 facilities
  • Built capacity of thousands of health workers nationwide on IPC COVID-19 skills through direct training and training of 12 national-level and 36 regional-level master trainers for cascaded knowledge transfer—skills included COVID-19 precautions, triage, safety of injection practices, disinfection, and waste management
  • Provided waste management training and materials to 17 regional referral hospitals and the Bouake University teaching hospital
  • Developed an asynchronous e-learning approach and modules on COVID-19 IPC precautions and PPE use, triage, safe environmental cleaning and disinfection, and waste management

COVID Vaccine Deployment

Indicators as of September 2023

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2786

Number of people trained on COVID-19 vaccine-related topics 

20

Number of COVID-19 vaccine multisectoral coordination mechanisms that meet regularly 

  • Built the capacities of 21 health districts nationwide on vaccine-related activities:   
    • Supported the development of micro-plans to identify and plan COVID-19 vaccination activities and put them into action to reach priority population groups 
    • Trained their vaccinating agents on injection safety, IPC, and waste management at vaccination sites 
    • Strengthened the capacity in managing vaccines and ancillary products stock through rapid assessments and monitoring stock levels during supervision visits
    • Trained staff on vaccine supply chain management, including logistics, proper storage, vaccine handling, and cold chain management
  • Helped deliver orientation workshops for regional directors of health, departmental directors of health, and Extended Program for Immunization coordinators at the regional and health district levels on the process of COVID-19 vaccination deployment—also provided technical support to validate the adverse events following immunization (AEFI) management guidelines for the regional and district AEFI focal points
  • Assessed IPC at COVID-19 vaccinations centers in 33 health regions, in collaboration with COVID-19 IPC working group and the Directorate of Coordination of the Expanded Immunization Program (DCPEV), and strengthened their compliance monitoring and improvement capacity
  • Trained 38 regional stakeholders to cascade their knowledge to 664 vaccinators in the 33 regions on IPC-related topics
  • Supported the National Institute for Public Hygiene and DCPEV for distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and syringes from the central warehouse to nine regional stores
  • Supported the National Program for the Fight against Metabolic Diseases and the Prevention of Non-Communicable Diseases to conduct supervisory visits to 30 hypertension and diabetes treatment units to strengthen COVID-19 vaccination processes for vulnerable populations and improve the management of comorbidities responsible for more than 80% of COVID-19 patient deaths
Launch of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in the presence of the prefectural authority and the Gbeke health regional director.

 

 

 

Launch of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in the presence of the prefectural authority and the Gbeke health regional director.

Photo credit: Dr. Ange Fulgence Ouffoue, MTaPS Côte d’Ivoire

 

Partners include:

  • DCPEV
  • Directorate General for Health
  • ICAP
  • National Institute for Public Hygiene
  • CDC
  • GAVI
  • UKAID
  • UNICEF
  • WHO
  • World Bank
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