The IHR-PVS National Bridging Workshop (global One Health flagship program) was held in Nepal from 19-21 March 2024 at the Gokarna Forest Resort of Kathmandu. The One Health Secretariat of Nepal, FAO, WHO, and WOAH jointly organized it. The workshop was graced by Mr Upendra Yadav, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Health and Population (MoHP), Minister of Agriculture and Livestock Development (MOALD), Secretaries and Director Generals, Representatives of FAO and WHO country offices, and Regional Representative of WOAH office in Tokyo. The event marked the transition of the chairpersonships of the Federal One Health (OH) Steering Committee and the Technical Coordination Committee from MOHP to MOALD. It demonstrated the high-level political commitment to OH in Nepal.
Using interactive and structured methods, scenario-based exercises, videos, and facilitation tools, the workshop engaged 134 participants from key OH national institutions of all three administrative levels. Participants from FAO, WHO, WOAH, UNICEF, and USAID also attended the workshop.
The workshop enhanced the importance of OH approach in addressing emerging infectious diseases, zoonoses, AMR, food safety, and environmental health. Critical gaps were identified and developed OH action plan such as the development a comprehensive national OH strategy, enabling instruments to empower and facilitate implementation of the OH approach, establishing functional OH governance structure at the subnational level, and developing integrated/coordinated surveillance, outbreak investigation, and response and risk assessment and communication mechanisms.