VEHA
Guidance
Guidance
Virtual Environmental and Humanitarian Adviser Tool – (VEHA Tool) is a tool
to easily integrate environmental considerations in humanitarian response. Field Implementation guidances are useful for the design and execution of humanitarian activities in the field.
The decision to implement a vaccination campaign is based on a series of factors including an assessment of general risk factors such as malnutrition, overcrowding, inadequate hygiene / WASH facilities, and disease-specific risks such as geography, climate, season, and population immunity. It is important to also take into account the feasibility of a campaign based on the characteristics of the vaccine as well as access to population and transport, which can be constrained by environmental factors.
Children, the elderly, and people living with the disease are more vulnerable to infections and should be prioritized for vaccinations.
Air pollution
Soil pollution
Water pollution
Cultural acceptance
Impact on wellbeing / mental health
Lack of or ineffective vaccination campaigns can lead to disease spread through:
Lack of vaccination or ineffective vaccination campaigns can lead to disease spread, which can be exacerbated through the built or natural environment such as contaminated surfaces, working in close proximity to infected people, contaminated water, food, soil, and cultural behaviours such as hygiene practices or frequency of public handshaking, hugging, kissing through to washing of dead bodies and widows prostrating themselves on their dead husbands’ corpses.
Humanitarian actors responding to the global Covid-19 outbreak have reported their most effective activities being Infection Prevention and Control through hygiene promotion and social distancing.
Time to assess vaccination requirements and develop appropriate campaigns. Time to assess cultural behaviours and develop disease transmission behaviour change campaigns.