Finding Community-led Solutions: An interagency guidance note on working with communities in high density settings to plan local approaches to preventing and managing COVID-19

Author: Risk Communication and Community Engagement Technical Working Group

This practical guidance note is intended for anyone involved in COVID-19 risk communication and community engagement (RCCE) efforts in complex and fragile settings in Africa, which includes refugee and internally displaced persons (IDP) camps and informal urban settlements. A combination of high population density, poor housing, limited access to water and sanitation, overstretched or inaccessible health services and widespread poverty, increase the risk and impact of a COVID-19 outbreak in these settings. Refugees, IDPs and people living in informal urban settlements, which are often home to urban refugees and irregular migrants, are often stigmatized and excluded from national response plans. This can lead to high level of mistrust towards authorities and responders within these groups. This is further exacerbated by the fact that standard COVID-19 prevention measures, such as physical distancing and handwashing, will be more challenging and in some cases even impossible to implement in crowded camps and informal settlements. This guidance note draws on and summarises content from a range of other guidance notes, many with a global focus or broader scope than RCCE.

Tazama mwongozo ndani Kiingereza hapa.

United States Agency for International Development Johns Hopkins Center for Humanitarian Health, Save the Children, Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs, UK Med, EcoHealth Alliance, Mercy Malaysia

Tovuti hii imewezekana kwa msaada wa Watu wa Marekani kupitia Shirika la Maendeleo ya Kimataifa la Marekani (USAID) chini ya mpango wa TAYARI. READY (sio kifupi) inaungwa mkono na USAID  Ofisi ya Demokrasia, Migogoro, na Usaidizi wa KibinadamuOfisi ya Msaada wa Maafa ya Kigeni ya Marekani (OFDA)  na inaongozwa na Okoa Watoto  kwa kushirikiana na  Kituo cha Johns Hopkins cha Afya ya Kibinadamu,,  Kituo cha Johns Hopkins cha Mipango ya Mawasiliano UK-MedMuungano wa EcoHealth, na Rehema Malaysia. Yaliyomo kwenye tovuti hii ni jukumu pekee la Save the Children. Maelezo yaliyotolewa kwenye tovuti hii si lazima yaakisi maoni ya USAID, washirika wowote au wote wa muungano, au Serikali ya Marekani, na si taarifa rasmi ya Serikali ya Marekani.