United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
Partner in emergency health operations
The municipality of Quibdo, Colombia won a Malaria Champion award for its work in challenging environments, among vulnerable populations. Above, an indigenous girl collects seeds in Quibdo.
Rapid crisis response that reaches the most vulnerable
OCHA and WHO collaborate to promptly deliver lifesaving humanitarian assistance in disease outbreaks, natural disasters and complex emergencies.
The agencies help countries prepare for crises and support them in mounting a fast and well-coordinated response. OCHA plays a critical role in advocating for, coordinating and funding humanitarian action at the earliest stage possible.
OCHA recently supported WHO and other health partners during the devastating hurricanes and cyclone in Grenada, Cuba and Madagascar, outbreaks of cholera in Comoros, Mozambique, Somalia and Zambia, and floods in Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya and South Sudan.
Emergency health programmes led by WHO and supported by OCHA strive to make health services available to everyone caught up in a crisis, taking into account the needs of vulnerable people, women, girls, children, the elderly, and people living with disabilities. The agencies seek to engage and empower local organizations in delivering humanitarian aid.
“CERF helps us make the world a healthier and safer place.”
Dr Tedros A. Ghebreyesus,
WHO Director-General
OCHA: a key contributor and partner in emergencies
OCHA contributes to WHO's humanitarian health programmes through two funding mechanisms: the Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), and the Country-based Pooled Funds (CBPFs). These funds support the emergency strategic objective of WHO's Fourteenth General Programme of Work, which seeks to protect seven billion people from health emergencies by 2028.
Established by the UN General Assembly in 2005 and funded by UN Member States, CERF is a mechanism for financing rapid responses to humanitarian operations and neglected crises. CBPFs, which have been set up in 19 countries so far, pool funding from donors to support local humanitarian efforts and complement other humanitarian funding.
OCHA contributed US$ 174 million through these mechanisms in 2022–23, making it the fourth-largest donor for outbreak, crisis and response. In 2023, WHO received US$ 74 million from CERF and US$ 10 million from CBPFs.
NOTE: The amounts represent the revenue received by WHO for the period stated, regardless of which biennium it was allocated to. Figures in WHO's Budget Portal may differ, as they represent funds available for each biennium net of programme support costs.
Health emergencies and humanitarian aid
CERF provides rapid funding for immediate health needs and to bring health emergency programmes to scale. In some cases, CERF funding helps cover the initial costs borne by the Contingency Fund for Emergencies (CFE), which aims to respond to humanitarian emergencies in 24 hours or less.
Ukraine
In the early days of the crisis in Ukraine, CERF contributions helped WHO set up four logistics hubs, eight warehouses, and a distribution system for emergency medical supplies.
WHO also procured and distributed more than 600 interagency emergency medical-supplies kits, more than 2000 WHO trauma and emergency-surgery kits, 25 000 tetanus vaccines and 13 ambulances for regions across Ukraine. To help shape the health response, WHO assigned 25 epidemiologists to gather information, including data on infectious diseases, the condition of hospitals and pharmacies, workforce shortages and more.
The medical supplies that were distributed covered three months of health care needs for more than 1.3 million people – including women, girls and people with disabilities – and about 500 emergency surgeries.
All-terrain ambulances arrive in a WHO warehouse, Lviv, Ukraine, 8 May 2022. © WHO / Viktor Moskaliuk
Kangaroo mother care (KMC) is an effective way to prevent mortality in both preterm and low birth weight (LBW) infants. © WHO / Blink Media - Hilina Abebe
Northern Ethiopia
More than five million people caught up in a civil conflict in Tigray are in dire need of humanitarian support, including health care. As Global Health Cluster lead, and with CERF funding, WHO is coordinating with 22 partners to provide emergency support, including prevention, preparedness and response to disease outbreaks.
The Tigray conflict has injured and traumatized millions of people and destroyed their livelihoods. The conflict, which began late in 2020, is intensifying humanitarian need in the neighboring regions of Afar and Amhara. More than two million people have been displaced and are living in crowded camps with poor access to water and sanitation.
South Sudan
WHO has teamed up with OCHA to deliver crucial health supplies in communities affected by floods and food insecurity in South Sudan. The supplies enabled health workers to serve more than 540 000 people; they responded to emergencies, gave vaccinations, treated malnutrition, cholera and pneumonia, and provided routine health care.
Health kits arrive in Unity State, South Sudan, to help flood victims, June 2022. © WHO / South Sudan / Jemila
When natural disasters become health emergencies
Natural disasters disrupt health services because they damage hospitals and clinics, harm health workers, and knock out utilities.
Health post under repair in Vanuatu following tropical Cyclone Harold. © WHO / Philippe Metois
Vanuatu
Tropical Cyclone Harold made landfall in April 2020, severely damaging three provinces. The CERF grant supported the Vanuatu Medical Assistance Team and the deployment and coordination of emergency medical teams during the first few weeks of the response, including technical support to national and provincial health emergency operations centres. Within one month, 32 emergency medical teams had been deployed, providing medical services to more than 5000 people.
CERF also enabled the prompt repair and reprovisioning of damaged health facilities.
Kenya
In May 2020, floods left more than 270 000 people homeless, the majority of whom were women and children. Outbreaks of cholera, chikungunya and measles followed. WHO used CERF funds to support partners as they developed response plans, investigated outbreaks, and reassigned 80 county health teams to provide an uninterrupted supply of essential medicines, which included cholera kits equipped to serve 100 000 people for three months. The CERF funds also enabled a measles vaccination campaign for children, boosted infection prevention and control, and supported diagnostic testing through the National Public Health Laboratory and other facilities. In 2018, nearly 6000 cholera patients in Kenya directly benefitted from CERF-funded work, and another 230 000 women and children indirectly benefitted.
OCHA supported a campaign in February 2023 that vaccinated about two million people. © WHO / Billy Miaron
Health supplies at the WHO warehouse in Kabul, Afghanistan are ready to be loaded on trucks for dispatch to heath facilities across the country. © WHO / Lindsay Mackenzi
Afghanistan
With CERF support, WHO provided emergency healthcare services during Afghanistan’s 2022 earthquake crisis, rehabilitated damaged health facilities and tackled communicable disease outbreaks. The effort helped some 184 000 people. Three mobile health teams were set up in earthquake zones and 400 community health workers were trained to provide psychological first aid.
Main referral hospitals received medical kits, equipment and training. To prevent outbreaks of communicable diseases, WHO provided medicine, medical supplies, bed nets and rapid diagnostic tests. To improve access to clean water and sanitation during the disaster, 14 facilities received portable water containers and hand-wash basins, water tanks, hand-washing supplies and incinerators, as well as assistance to bore water wells and construct and repair toilets.
More than 18 million people need humanitarian assistance as a result of 40 years of war, natural disasters, chronic poverty, drought, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Conflict and instability have complicated efforts to assist populations in need.
Health emergencies and disease outbreaks
Rwanda
When the Democratic Republic of the Congo declared an Ebola outbreak in August 2018, major risk factor for spread included large-scale movement of people and goods across borders. In response, WHO designated neighboring Burundi, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda as high-priority countries for Ebola-preparedness activities.
CERF made it possible to rapidly scale up preparedness across Rwanda, including in refugee camps. Working with 1230 health workers from 376 health facilities, CERF and WHO enhanced surveillance for early detection, built capacity for case management, infection prevention and control, psychosocial support, safe laboratory specimen collection, screening at points of entry, ambulance services and safe, dignified burials.
CERF’s grant also made is possible for Rwanda to test laboratory samples locally using GeneXpert and RT-PCR equipment.
Lebanon Minister of Health Minister Dr Firass Abiad and the country’s WHO Representative Dr Abdinasir Abubakar at the launch of the oral cholera vaccine campaign. © WHO
Lebanon
In October 2022, CERF support enabled Lebanon to halt the country’s first cholera outbreak in 30 years.
WHO worked with the health ministry to administer oral cholera vaccine to more than one million people in just over three months. The campaign offered the vaccine at health facilities but also went door to door to make sure that vulnerable groups were not bypassed. The campaign prioritized health care workers, prisoners, people living in refugee camps and their host communities.
The assistance was vital to Lebanon’s health system, which was already strained by the country’s economic and political upheavals.
COVID-19 pandemic
The fast release of two CERF global allocations helped bolster weak health systems in countries that were considered likely to face a severe impact from the pandemic: Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Chad, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Ethiopia, Haiti, Lebanon, Libya, Mali, Niger, Nigeria and Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine and Venezuela.
Each country prioritized its needs as set forth in the COVID-19 Global Humanitarian Response Plan to contain the pandemic’s spread.
Mobile health workers provided vaccine service to Syrian people in rural Hama and Homs governorates during a COVID-19 campaign supported by WHO. © WHO
A health department employee in Honduras spraying homes to stop disease-carrying mosquitoes. © PAHO
Honduras
CERF was a leading partner in strengthening health services in Honduras to fight an outbreak of dengue fever that hit the country during the COVID-19 pandemic. More than 400 volunteers were quickly trained to expand the health network’s capacity to diagnose the dangerous mosquito-borne illness and other prevalent diseases. The project also supported equipment, supplies, disease-outbreak monitoring and telemedicine appointments, with special attention to vulnerable groups.
CERF: A lifeline for people in forgotten crises worldwide
CERF provides funding for humanitarian assistance in longstanding, neglected crises and areas where there is no other donor support. CERF has been essential for providing vital health services in Burkina Faso, Chad, Colombia, Djibouti, Eritrea, Niger, occupied Palestinian territory and elsewhere.
WHO delivers high-performance tents for health posts, which were procured with funding support from CERF. © WHO / Burkina Faso
Burkina Faso
CERF’s support enabled WHO to continue essential health services during a humanitarian crisis and in a precarious security situation in Burkina Faso. Help included more than 300 000 medical consultations covering a wide range of needs. Services were provided for severe malnutrition, acute psychological distress, gender-based violence, vaccination, treatment of wounds and medical evacuations.
CERF funds also helped establish mobile clinics and health posts that covered almost 90 0000 people, provided emergency health kits that served more than 120 000 people, and trained health care workers and village midwives to help support pregnant women in areas where health facilities had been closed down.