Public Health Associate at United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees: (Deadline 14 February 2025)

February 14, 2025

Public Health Associate

Organizational Setting and Work Relationships

The Public Health Associate is a member of a multidisciplinary team and contributes to ensuring that UNHCR’s public health programmes meet minimum UNHCR and global health standards in order to minimise avoidable morbidity and mortality among forcibly displaced and stateless persons and towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Public health programmes include primary health care, secondary health care, sexual and reproductive health (including HIV), nutrition, mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS). The incumbent provides effective guidance and support to partners on UNHCR’s responses in public health.

S/he will contribute to advancing the concepts found in UNHCR’s Global Public Health Strategy as well as the Global Compact on Refugees (GCR) and the mainstreaming/inclusion of refugees into national health programmes and systems.

The Public Health Associate is usually supervised by a more senior public health staff or in the absence thereof, by operations/programmes staff.

All UNHCR staff members are accountable to perform their duties as reflected in their job description. They do so within their delegated authorities, in line with the regulatory framework of UNHCR which includes the UN Charter, UN Staff Regulations and Rules, UNHCR Policies and Administrative Instructions as well as relevant accountability frameworks. In addition, staff members are required to discharge their responsibilities in a manner consistent with the core, functional, cross-functional and managerial competencies and UNHCR’s core values of professionalism, integrity and respect for diversity.

Duties

• Assist the implementation of public health programmes with partners and health authorities in a multi-sectoral and coordinated manner.
• Assist efforts towards public health programming towards greater inclusion and access of refugees to national health systems.
• Participate in relevant coordination and collaboration structures as requested.
• Participate in emergency responses to new refugee influxes and disease outbreaks.
• Support gathering information for relevant assessments and identification of needs.
• Work closely with programme and other units as applicable in programme planning and monitoring.
• Support intersectoral collaboration throughout all stages of programme cycle between public health, and other sectoral areas to promote synergies and maximise impact.
• Assist in the use of the relevant UNHCR Health Information System suite of tools and surveys to support in analysis, interpretation, reporting and use of public health data.
• Assist in capacity strengthening of partners to ensure the technical integrity of public health programmes.
• Support the identification and management of risks and seek to seize opportunities impacting objectives in the area of responsibility. Ensure decision making is risk based in the functional area of work. Raise risks, issues and concerns to a supervisor or to relevant functional colleague(s).
• Perform other related duties as required.

For positions in country operations

• Assist in efforts to enhance the technical integrity of health care services and that they are based on Ministry of Health, UNHCR and/or internationally recognized and most up-to-date standards and policies.
• Assist in the process of preparing and processing medicine and medical supply orders with partners.
• Assist in ensuring community engagement and community participation in health programming.
• Monitor and support compliance with UNHCR Public Health Administrative Instruction/standard operating procedures.

For positions in regional bureaux

• Assist in the coordination of public health programmes across the regional bureau and with country operations including assimilation and documentation of better practice/lessons learnt for dissemination.
• Support effective collaborative approaches across the departments in the bureaux and with HQ.

Minimum Qualifications

Years of Experience / Degree Level

For G6 – 3 years relevant experience with High School Diploma; or 2 years relevant work experience with Bachelor or equivalent or higher

Field(s) of Education

Not applicable.

Certificates and/or Licenses

Medicine;                            Nursing;               Public Health;                     Epidemiology;

(Certificates and Licenses marked with an asterisk* are essential)

Relevant Job Experience

Essential

Experience in public health programming as well as understanding of health systems and health system building blocks. Experience with data collection and analysis in position(s) where the ability to draft clear, concise documentation was essential.

Desirable

Experience in public health emergency preparedness and response. Experience in humanitarian settings. Experience with coordination and stakeholder engagement to achieve public health goals. Experience with health information systems. Experience with the provision of quality-assured medicines and medical supplies.

Functional Skills

PM-Project monitoring and evaluation

PH-Public Health Epidemiology

MD- HIV/AIDS situation management

MD-Reproductive Health

PH-Community Health – Health Data Collection/Analysis/Interpretation

(Functional Skills marked with an asterisk* are essential)

Language Requirements

For International Professional and Field Service jobs: Knowledge of English and UN working language of the duty station if not English.

For National Professional jobs: Knowledge of English and UN working language of the duty station if not English and local language.

For General Service jobs: Knowledge of English and/or UN working language of the duty station if not English.

Competency Requirements

All jobs at UNHCR require six core competencies and may also require managerial competencies and/or cross-functional competencies. The six core competencies are listed below.

Core Competencies

Accountability

Communication

Organizational Awareness

Teamwork & Collaboration

Commitment to Continuous Learning

Client & Result Orientation

Cross-Functional Competencies

Planning & Organizing

Stakeholder Management

Technological Awareness

All UNHCR workforce members must individually and collectively, contribute towards a working environment where each person feels safe, and empowered to perform their duties. This includes by demonstrating no tolerance for sexual exploitation and abuse, harassment including sexual harassment, sexism, gender inequality, discrimination, and abuse of power.

As individuals and as managers, all must be proactive in preventing and responding to inappropriate conduct, support ongoing dialogue on these matters and speaking up and seeking guidance and support from relevant UNHCR resources when these issues arise.

This is a Standard Job Description for all UNHCR jobs with this job title and grade level. The Operational Context may contain additional essential and/or desirable qualifications relating to the specific operation and/or position. Any such requirements are incorporated by reference in this Job Description and will be considered for the screening, shortlisting and selection of candidates.

The incumbent of this position reports to the Head of Office based in Kirehe and is expected to provide day-to-day oversight & and technical guidance on all matters related to Public Health programme in Mahama Camp.

In addition to performing the routine activities, the position requires concrete expertise, knowledge and understanding of the International and national healthcare standards, guidelines, protocols and collaboration with local institutions and the relevant partners to ensure adherence to the health standards in the refugee camp

The incumbent will ensure regularly the monitoring of the performance of Partner(s) providing quality health services within the AoR in accordance with (inter)national guidelines and protocols and well as monitoring of the quality and effectiveness of health services within Mahama camp, report findings and address issues to the supervisor for follow up.

Delivery of coordination function and capacity building on Public Health Topic, is a key priority for this role and the incumbent will be expected to facilitate trainings on those topics for relevant partners and government health care staff as well as community-based structures, in collaboration with relevant partners

Operational context

Occupational Safety and Health Considerations:

To view occupational safety and health considerations for this duty station, please visit this link:

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel

Nature of Position:

Living and Working Conditions:

Additional Qualifications

Skills

MD-HIV/AIDS situation management, MD-Reproductive Health, PH-Community Health-Health Data Collection/Analysis/Interpretation, PH- Public Health Epidemiology, PM-Project monitoring and evaluation

Certifications

Epidemiology – Other, Medicine – Other, Nursing – Other, Public Health – Other

Competencies

Accountability, Client & results orientation, Commitment to continuous learning, Communication, Organizational awareness, Planning & organizing, Stakeholder management, Teamwork & collaboration, Technological awareness

https://icsc.un.org/Home/SalaryScales

Compendium

Additional Information

This position requires Functional Clearance