Global Convening on COVID-19 Vaccination Monitoring and Related System Strengthening
Overview
The COVID-19 vaccine rollout has required unprecedented levels of in depth and near real-time implementation data to support programmatic decision-making. Governments, international agencies, and other partners have made every effort to make sure these needs have been met. As the pandemic and vaccine rollout have evolved, however, data needs have shifted. Now, as countries move to routinize COVID-19 vaccines and as many end states of emergency for COVID-19, monitoring activities will need to merge with existing practices, while exploring opportunities to enhance of such practices where feasible. This will necessitate adjusting the breadth, depth, and frequency of monitoring.
Given this changing landscape and the need for alignment on the way forward, representatives from WHO and UNICEF, both at headquarters and regional levels, Gavi, US CDC, Africa CDC, European CDC, USAID, GIZ, World Bank, JSZI, HISP, and select Member States came together in Geneva, Switzerland from 13-15 March 2023.
The meeting was a pivotal moment in the COVID-19 vaccination monitoring and systems strengthening space, as an important opportunity to bring together different stakeholders and experts to conduct a comprehensive stock take and jointly plan a way forward. Coming out of the meeting, the participants made a series of recommendations for country-, regional-, and global-level actors to establish and advance key monitoring and systems strengthening priorities on the way to COVID-19 vaccine integration.