On May 18, 2022 the World Health Organization (WHO), in collaboration with leading global health and emergency response organizations, released a roadmap for aligning WHO and partner contributions to building workforce capacity for essential public health functions, including a focus on emergency preparedness and response. TEPHINET was among the eight contributing organizations who came together to develop a collective vision for driving progress toward health workforce capacity building and strengthening countries’ ability to perform essential public health functions and engage in emergency preparedness and response.
The roadmap outlines three major action items for achieving its vision of "a strengthened workforce in every country; delivering all the essential public health functions including emergency preparedness and response for universal healthcare, health security and improved health and well-being." These include defining essential public health functions and services; mapping and measuring the occupations that perform these functions; and delivering competency-based education.
The document emphasizes the importance of a collaborative, unified approach to paving the way for countries, WHO, and partners to strengthen health systems and develop a skilled global health workforce able to detect and respond to health threats.