Public Health Expert (Epidemiology) - WHO-SEARO

Organizational Context

The World Health Organization (WHO) is a UN specialized agency dedicated to promoting health, ensuring global safety, and serving vulnerable populations. Operating across 194 Member States, WHO strives for the highest level of health for all. The South-East Asia Regional Office (SEARO), based in New Delhi, supports 10 Member States in addressing health challenges. The Health Promotion, Disease Prevention & Control (HDC) Department, specifically the Surveillance & Epidemiology Team, focuses on strengthening disease surveillance systems and generating evidence to guide public health interventions.

Job Purpose

This role supports the WHO SEARO's Health Promotion, Disease Prevention & Control (HDC) Department, focusing on strengthening integrated surveillance approaches, particularly Wastewater and Environmental Surveillance (WES), within the Multi Disease Elimination (MDE) agenda. The UNV will contribute to evidence synthesis, donor engagement, strategic communication, and analytical work for innovative surveillance methods. Key contributions include assisting in the development of regional WES strategies and policy briefs, coordinating with partners, and supporting the rollout of WES activities funded by the EC HERA initiative. The role also involves developing regional and country surveillance products, documenting capacities, and synthesizing implementation experiences to advance SEARO's integrated surveillance vision.

Responsibilities

The role involves supporting regional integrated surveillance frameworks, including Wastewater and Environmental Surveillance (WES), aligned with the Multi Disease Elimination (MDE) agenda. This includes contributing to WES strategy development, policy briefs, and coordinating with partners. The position will also support the finalization and implementation of the Regional Communicable Disease Surveillance Framework and explore integrated surveillance across communicable and non-communicable diseases. Responsibilities extend to partnership and communication efforts, including donor landscape analysis, drafting engagement materials, and creating visibility products. Additionally, the role will focus on evidence generation for emerging diseases, strengthening pathogen confirmation, and supporting analytical work on Non-Communicable Disease (NCD) and mental health surveillance systems, including data quality, registry analysis, and implementation of health initiatives.

Work Experience

A minimum of seven years of professional experience is required in public health surveillance, epidemiology, communicable disease control, or health information systems, preferably in a national public health institution, ministry of health, or academic/research setting. Experience with routine health data, surveillance indicators, and basic epidemiologic analysis is essential. Desirable experience includes contributing to communicable disease surveillance activities, familiarity with NCD or mental health data, laboratory or environmental surveillance, and preparing technical outputs. Experience in the South-East Asian Region is preferred.

Skills

Key competencies include teamwork, communication, respecting and promoting individual and cultural differences, producing results, adapting to change, and self-management. Strong analytical and research skills are needed for data interpretation and synthesis. Proficiency in English, standard office applications, and basic data handling tools is required. Experience in technical writing, collaboration with diverse partners, and managing multiple tasks efficiently is also important.

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