One thousand (1000) community workers will be trained and certified through the HEART Trust/NTA under the guidance of the local Medical Officer of Health starting July 4, 2016. The training forms part of the Ministry of Health’s Phase Two Response to the Zika Virus.
The training will include individuals from fourteen parishes who will be engaged for eight (8) weeks. It will consist of both classroom sessions and field experience. Community workers will have one lecture session per week and the remaining four (4) days will be spent in the field so that the participants can get hands on experience as part of training.
During the period they will engage householders and assist them to search for mosquito breeding sites around their homes; they will also treat breeding sites that cannot be destroyed and remove the ones that can be destroyed. The community workers will hand out educational material including those that focus on precautions pregnant women should take to avoid being bitten by mosquitoes. At the end of the training, the volunteers will be certified to assist with the implementation of Vector Control Programmes.
The Ministry of Health will be collaborating with Members of Parliament, Parish Councils, the Social Development Commission and the HEART Trust/NTA to implement the programme. Minister of Health, Dr. Christopher Tufton says “we expect that this formal training will allow us to have a core group of properly certified persons that we can easily call upon for similar activities in the future.”
This certification programme is expected to make the community workers more equipped to undertake community level public health interventions. Workers who were previously trained as part of the Ministry’s zika response activities are to be included in this batch.
Individuals who wish to obtain more information may call the Ministry of Health or the nearest health centre. Persons may also visit our website at moh.gov.jm and like and follow us onwww.facebook.com/themohgovjm; https://twitter.com/themohgovjm; https://instagram.com/themohgovjm.