Country Lead at Elizabeth Glaser

Project Overview (Anticipated UNITAID COVID 19 Project)

The emergence of the COVID-19 global pandemic has posed new challenges to already strained health systems worldwide. Governments have had to start prevention, containment and mitigation measures rapidly while evolving as new information becomes available. The anticipated UNITAID COVID 19 project will work with the national and county governments Covid 19 response teams to accelerate end-to-end access to novel solutions for responding to the COVID-19 pandemic through testing, isolation, care and treatment approaches adapted to the needs of low- and middle-income countries such as Kenya.  The Country Lead will be based in Nairobi County and will work with MoH and partners at national and subnational levels on novel Covid-19 testing solutions and approaches to improve access to COVID-19 identification and management.

Job Summary

Under the supervision of the Director of Programs, in collaboration with Ministry of Health (MoH), local partners and the UNITAID COVID-19 Project, the Country Lead will undertake the following activities to strengthen access to Covid 19 testing, care and treatment management in Nairobi County in relation to COVID-19 Pandemic.
 Responsibilities

• Strategic dialogue and advocacy with country policy makers and ministries on relevant innovative diagnostics including self-testing and therapeutics.
• Advocacy for integrating covid-19 testing, care, and treatment innovations into existing service delivery platforms (e.g., MNCH, TB, HIV) through evidence generation, including through rapid learning cycles.
• Re-design diagnostics networks, using hub and spoke models, in partnership with MOH authorities, to facilitate rapid roll out of testing and reporting of results as part of building an optimized diagnostics network.
• Work with MOH and other partners to identify effective and innovative models of care to improve detection of covid-19 cases.
• Oversee rapid uptake of and access to covid-19 care and treatment, including through the implementation of innovative models of care.
• Provide leadership in development of innovative and efficient patient pathways based upon disease stage (e.g., community-based management for mild and moderate cases; clinical facility-based care for severe cases).
• Work with the MOH to develop holistic national implementation plans for current and future treatments, including WHO-recommended therapeutic interventions.
• Provide leadership in generation of novel evidence and cost analysis to inform policy guidelines and further scale up by additional countries/counties, donors, and implementers.
• Work with the community health strategies and other stakeholders to elevate the Community awareness and demand creation for COVID-19 testing, care and treatment services.
• Oversee effective and sustainable transition to national programs at the project close out.

Required Qualifications and Skills

• A bachelor’s degree in medicine and surgery (MBCHB) or equivalent. At least 5 years in infectious disease program work experience (especially within the context of health systems strengthening or health systems development in capacity building); or quality assurance/quality management.
• Actively engaged in the Covid -19 response at national and sub-national level.
• Ability to translate and adapt international guidelines into local context. In-depth understanding of the country’s health system.
• Demonstrated ability to work with senior MoH officials at national and subnational levels.

Competencies

The Foundation expects all employees to possess the fundamental competencies of interpersonal skills, communication, accountability, continual learning, and driving results. The ideal candidate will either be proficient or advanced in the following set of competencies, specific to this position’s level of Manager:

• Developing Others – Developing others is a person’s ability to perform and contribute to the organization by providing ongoing feedback and by providing opportunities to learn through formal and informal methods.
• Managing Conflict – Managing conflict is a person’s ability to encourage creative tension and differences of opinions. He/she will anticipate and take steps to prevent counter-productive confrontations while resolving conflicts and disagreements in a constructive manner.
• Managing People – Managing people is a person’s ability to build and manage workforce based on organization goals, budget, considerations, and staff needs. He/she will ensure that employees are appropriately recruited, selected, appraised, and rewarded. He/she will also manage a multi-cultural workforce and a variety of workforce situations.