Global One Health News

New polio vaccine reaches millions of children in Ethiopia

Public health officials in Ethiopia can rest a little easier now that the new polio vaccine (nOPV2) has been successfully administered to 14.5 million children under the age of five across 10 regions of the country. The 2025 vaccination campaign also encompassed broader public health initiatives including monitoring disease patterns and holding community health screenings. The Global One Health initiative supported the planning and implementation of the campaign.

The campaign met 104% of its target vaccination goal. Key activities included microplanning support, on-site monitoring of mobile vaccination teams, assessment of vaccine cold chain logistics and oversight of mobilizing communities to address public health issues.

Training lays foundation for the prevention and control of Mpox in Ethiopia

In response to the international public health emergency declared due to the Mpox outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and recent reports of the virus in Ethiopia, a specialized training was conducted in Addis Ababa to enhance the skills of health professionals. Organized by the Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI) in collaboration with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Ohio State Global One Health initiative, the training aimed to strengthen case management, specimen handling, infection prevention and control (IPC) and laboratory biosafety to effectively manage and contain the outbreak within Ethiopia.

Thirty-nine health professionals from various hospitals and health centers, the Addis Ababa Regional Health Bureau and Regional Laboratory and the EPHI participated in the two-day training session in late July. A multidisciplinary team of IPC specialists, epidemiologists, public health experts and laboratory specialists with expertise in outbreak prevention and capacity building conducted the training.

Boosting data skills to analyze safety of medicines and vaccines

Nineteen specialists from Ethiopia’s Food and Drug Authority took part in a four-day workshop in July to learn how to better track and analyze the safety of medicines and vaccines. The training, part of the Global One Health Summer Institute, was organized by the Global One Health initiative and the EFDA.

The workshop focused on helping attendees learn more about detecting, assessing, understanding and preventing the adverse effects of medicines and vaccines. The goal of the training was to help local experts use information more effectively when making regulatory decisions about medicines and public health.

Enhancing Mpox case detection and response in Addis Ababa

A three-day orientation held from July 31 to August 2 at Zewditu Memorial Hospital in Addis Ababa trained 224 frontline healthcare workers on community-based surveillance for Mpox. The training focused on case detection, diagnosis, notification and referral linkages. Supported by the Ohio State Global One Health Initiative and CDC Ethiopia, the training aimed to enhance Mpox case identification and response at the district level with participants identifying gaps and developing action plans to address them.

Zero-Dose Cholera project evaluation

The Global One Health initiative’s (GOHi) Zero-Dose Cholera project is working to find out why some children do not get vaccinated or only get some vaccines in areas of the Oromia and Somali regions that are at high and low risk for cholera. The findings from this research will help improve vaccination programs in Ethiopia and potentially other countries.

The GOHi supervisory team recently visited with its team onsite to evaluate the project’s progress. They reviewed key aspects such as vaccination records, how vaccines are given, stored and transported, status of cold storage, how many people are getting vaccinated compared to those who are not, how records are kept, how vaccination services are combined with other health services and how information is used to plan vaccination activities more effectively.

Workshop on modeling arboviral diseases

A workshop on modeling diseases spread by mosquitoes and other insects – called arboviral diseases – was recently held in Addis Ababa. The workshop was hosted by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), the Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI) and Ohio State’s Global One Health initiative. Rebecca Garabed, assistant dean for graduate studies in Ohio State's College of Veterinary Medicine, led the training along with others from Kenya and Ethiopia. Modeling these diseases is very important because illnesses like chikungunya, dengue and yellow fever are becoming more common around the world.

"The Arboviral Diseases Modeling is essential for predicting outbreaks, understanding the transmission dynamics, assessing climate change impacts, and evaluate interventions. Keep harnessing diseases modeling in public health emergency management systems for better emergency preparedness and response operations," said a senior public health specialist and epidemiologist.

Recent GOHi publications

The GOHi team continuously works to address the spread of disease, promote health and emphasize the connection among humans, animals and the environment. One way GOHi does this is through research. Read some of the latest projects the team has worked on:

• Evaluation of the sentinel surveillance system for influenza-like illness and severe acute respiratory infection in Ethiopia during the COVID-19 pandemic, 2021–2023
• Gram-negative bacterial sepsis, antimicrobial susceptibility pattern and treatment outcomes at two neonatal intensive care units in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: A retrospective observational study