Achieving the WHO 2030 NTD Roadmap goals: systems and data-driven approaches to improve program strategy, planning and implementation for the elimination of PC-NTDs

This session seeks to focus on the shifts in approaches used to address NTDs as outlined in the WHO 2030 Roadmap. The WHO 2030 roadmap states that NTDs are designated as “neglected” partly because they are frequently overlooked by national health systems and encourages vertical interventions against NTDs, such as MDA, to integrate into community and national health information systems. This session will provide a real-world example of integration as experienced by the Ethiopia NTD programme as they have worked toward integration for the past four years. Key challenges, such as system uptake and sustainability, will be debated within the group to ensure future attempts of system strengthening, implementation and use build on country-specific learnings.

Further, this session will highlight how access to data and information through integrated systems is not only creating a positive demand loop for more timely and high-quality data, but also enabling the visualization and use of national data to inform programmatic decisions at national and operational levels, as countries face increasing challenges to address mapping gaps, areas of persistent high prevalence and overall gaps in resources.

We will highlight opportunities for the use of data and analytics in the routine design and implementation of NTD programmes, as well as explore how programmes outside of NTDs are already mainstreaming programmatic activities and promoting data use for programmatic decisions, which provides a useful framework for NTDs.

Overall, the session will illustrate gaps, approaches and best practices for the overall data process for NTDs – data availability and access, analysis and visualization and data use and feedback. For data use, new opportunities such as use of outputs and recommendations from mathematical models to inform strategic planning (e.g. how best to target MDA resources based on resource constraints) need to be introduced and streamlined into NTD programming at country level.