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Yap, FSM - The Pacific Island Health Officers' Association (PIHOA), through funding support from the U.S. Department of State's Diminishing Dengue in the Indo-Pacific with Climate Services: Developing Predictive Models Towards a Regional Early Warning System (EWS) Against Dengue grant, has partnered with the Federated States of Micronesia's Yap State Department of Health Services (DHS) to help reduce the threat of dengue by establishing systems and building local capacity for the early detection of Dengue as an effective approach to prevent and control Dengue and minimize harm to vulnerable communities.
During the week-long visit in the first week of November 2023, PIHOA's vector management team (Dr. Limb Hapairai, Regional Medical Entomologist; Dr. Tomás León, Regional Climate Sciences Consultant; and Ms. Jacquelyn Lefagoyal, Data and Community Engagement Assistant), introduced the dengue early warning systems project to key Yap DHS staff. The team also met with stakeholders, including the Yap Weather Service Office and the Yap State Environmental Protection Agency, to coordinate data availability and future EWS activities.
Yap DHS Director Maria Marfel said, "I'm pleased to see movement on the Dengue Early Warning System as it's been a while since the initial discussion on this project. Yap State is known to have multiple vectors favoring conditions for mosquito-borne illness outbreaks. Now that the initial data collection is complete, I look forward to further development in this project with relevant stakeholders, especially EPAs, to coordinate the training and licensing of pesticide applications for Yap. I believe the opportunity fosters good working relationships with other offices and agencies in Yap and boosts employees' morale in the workplace. With that, I express my deep appreciation and thanks for your [PIHOA's] time with the Yap team."
The team met with DHS' environmental health staff to learn how vector-borne disease and mosquito data are collected, stored, and used. Dr. León stated that his long journey from California to Yap was worthwhile. As a multidisciplinary research scientist, he better understands how climate, health, and vector data can be used in the EWS context. He noted that, "the relationships we have fostered will be important as we work to create the dengue EWS models and frameworks that will be shared and operationalized with our Yap health partners and the public."
The environmental health staff received training on mosquito surveillance and control for outbreak prevention and response protocols to streamline the implementation of EWS against dengue. Jason F. Sulog, Coordinator of Environmental Health, commented that he learned a lot from the training and is excited about the pesticide training next year. He is looking forward to working with the EWS group to develop a vector protocol to assist his office in planning a more efficient outbreak response. Utilizing this EWS tool would benefit his office to better prepare, respond in advance, and prevent future outbreaks of mosquito-borne illnesses.
The visit also identified additional training necessary to help build Yap State's stakeholder capacity, including pesticide application license, data for decision-making, utilizing climate data, and protocol and template building. This training and community engagement activities will commence in early 2024.
The PIHOA vector management team will work closely with Yap State's EpiNet team to set up EWS at the stakeholder and community level to prevent and reduce the severity of future dengue and other arbovirus outbreaks.
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