Islamabad:At a time when Pakistan remains one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, the Health Services Academy has begun turning Islamabad into a national test case for pandemic readiness by training the entire frontline health system of the capital under a federally funded One Health programme.
A two day intensive training for district managers and in service frontline health workers from across the Islamabad Capital Territory was launched on Tuesday at the Health Services Academy, bringing together staff from the District Health Office, PIMS, Polyclinic, the CDA Health Directorate, public sector hospitals and private healthcare facilities to strengthen the city’s ability to prevent, detect and respond to outbreaks.
The training is part of the Public Sector Development Programme project on One Health Workforce Development for Pandemic Readiness, a flagship federal initiative approved by the government and assigned to HSA to build Pakistan’s first integrated epidemic defence system that links human health, animal health, food safety and the environment.
Vice Chancellor Health Services Academy Prof Shahzad Ali Khan said the pandemic had exposed deep coordination gaps between sectors that deal with disease threats. He told participants that outbreaks do not respect institutional boundaries and that the One Health approach cannot work unless all departments are trained to operate as a single system.
“Today’s training of in service health staff of ICT is another important step towards making Islamabad a model district for pandemic preparedness,” he said, adding that the capital was being used to pilot a system that could later be scaled up nationally.
Pakistan faces one of the highest burdens of zoonotic and climate sensitive diseases in the region. According to national disease surveillance data, more than 60 percent of infectious outbreaks reported in recent years, including dengue, chikungunya, avian influenza and Crimean Congo haemorrhagic fever, have links to animals, food systems or environmental factors, yet these sectors have traditionally worked in silos.
National One Health Coordinator Prof Tariq Mehmood told the gathering that the PSDP project was designed to close those gaps by training the people who are first to see an outbreak. He said the programme focuses on in service workers because district level staff are the ones who identify unusual disease patterns, collect samples and trigger early warning systems.
He said that under the project HSA has already completed a training needs assessment, mapped the One Health system of Islamabad, developed standardised training manuals and conducted Training of Trainers workshops across health, livestock, environment, food and related departments.
“This is not a seminar project. This is about building a working epidemic defence system in the capital that can detect threats early and stop them before they become national emergencies,” he said.
He added that One Health is not just about coordination but about systems thinking, where data, surveillance, laboratories, field workers and policy makers are connected in real time.“When a poultry worker reports unusual bird deaths, or when environmental officers see changes in water or waste, that information must immediately reach the health system. That is how pandemics are prevented, not after hospitals are full,” he said.
Under the PSDP project, Islamabad is being developed as Pakistan’s first One Health model district, with frontline workers from hospitals, clinics, veterinary services, municipal services and environmental departments trained to operate within a single outbreak response framework.
