11/10/09 - Mekong Infectious Diseases - Behavior Change and Communication (MID-BCC) Project

USAID has awarded AED a three-year contract on behavior change and communication to help reduce outbreaks of avian and pandemic influenza (API), malaria, and other infectious diseases in Southeast Asia. Building on AED�s work since 2005 in avian and pandemic influenza, the Mekong Infectious Diseases - Behavior Change and Communication (MID-BCC) Project will include malaria and dengue fever in its technical scope as well as influenza, and its geographical focus will include Cambodia, China, Thailand, as well as Lao PDR and Vietnam where AED is currently working.

10/07/09 - Pretesting of the Field Epidemiologists Training Program (FETP) Curriculum in Bangkok, Thailand

Field Epidemiology Training Program: Applied Communication Skills (PDF)

On September 23, 2009, 15 FETP and FET/V trainees, advisors and staff participated in a one-day training pretest of the newly developed "Applied Communication Skills" Curriculum at the Richmond Hotel, near the Ministry of Public Health in Bangkok, Thailand. Participants also included 2 US CDC advisors to the FETP. The pretest was moderated by a professional researcher who conducted feedback sessions following each of the three sessions and an overall evaluation at the end of the day. The training consists of three Lessons, providing the trainees with key communication skills they will need, especially when conducting and reporting on outbreak investigations. Through discussions, 'hands-on' learning activities and feedback sessions, as well as 'on-camera' interview role plays, trainees improved their skills in areas such as listening and asking questions, developing talking points and key messages, and message delivery.

09/23/09 - Conceptual Framework for Avian and Pandemic Influenzas and Other Emerging Infectious Diseases

View the Conceptual Framework Page | Brochure (PDF)

As a result of three years of on-the-ground behavior change communication work and research on H5N1 in over 19 countries, AED pooled its research and other lessons learned and designed a communication conceptual framework that can be used to respond to avian flu outbreaks and other epizootics. An interactive website is forthcoming to showcase the "Communication Conceptual Framework for AHI and Other Emerging Infectious Diseases."

The framework is based on a six-part premise: 1) With awareness and understanding of the background context, 2) the selection of strategies and interventions are designed to act upon behavioral determinants, which in turn will 3) act upon behavioral determinants, which in turn will, 4) influence specific behaviors and activities, 5) that can affect viral transmission, thus 6) preventing new infections. In each step, users of the framework can select an array of choices for the context (e.g., production systems, political and organizational structure, endemicity, socioeconomic factors); strategies and interventions (e.g., communication, policy, capacity building, private sector partnerships, reporting and surveillance); behavioral determinants (e.g., external or internal); desired actions (e.g., reservoir control, blocking actions, preventing infection within the target group); biological determinants (e.g., risk of viral transmission); and outcomes (e.g., infections averted).

This framework can be used in a variety of settings - urban and rural, developing and industry settings - and applied to avian and human influenzas as well as other emerging infectious diseases. As we move into new areas (emerging infectious diseases and possibly malaria and dengue in Thailand), new opportunities to test and further develop the Conceptual Framework are in the offing.