From August 26 – 30, 2024, Countdown’s Immunization Coverage and Inequalities: Strengthening of Evidence and Analytical Capacity in Sub-Saharan Africa Project will hold a multi-country analysis workshop in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.

The workshop’s purpose is for country teams to finalize and synthesize their results from the different analyses and develop a report with key recommendations that can guide future strategic discussions for accelerating coverage of routine immunization within countries and the region. They will also document existing inequality and identify groups of children who are being left behind.

The workshop’s objectives  include;

• Support country analysts to develop a set of national and subnational estimates for key routine immunization indicators, including gender and equity, using a five-year time series of the routine health data through 2023, the latest (from 2000) household survey data, and other data sources available.
• Strengthen the country teams’ skills in analyzing routine health facility data (national and subnational) and household survey data.
• Enrich country-led progress monitoring by supporting the development and implementation of comparable methods to estimate coverage from health facility data and other sources.
• To synthesize and interpret all results from DHS and HMIS analysis and make strategic recommendations based on them.
• To complete the country report first full draft using a template provided by CD study facilitators.

Invited to the workshop are teams from 26 Countdown to 2030 collaborating countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Each team will consist of an analyst from either a public health institution (academic/research) or the Ministry of Health with an interest in immunization research and a representative from the department/division/ unit in charge of the Expanded Program for Immunization (EPI) involved in immunization analysis or decision-making.

Experts from the African Population Health Research Centre (APHRC), the University of Pelotas, John Hopkins University, the University of Southampton, WHO (global, Afro, and sub-region), UNICEF (global, Afro, and sub-region), and GAVI will facilitate the workshop.

Below is the draft workshop agenda;