Noncommunicable diseases and mental health
• Interventions to improve breast cancer survival in the Region
• Pilot testing of mobile phone surveys to strengthen NCD risk factors surveillance in countries of the Region
• Identifying and testing delivery strategies for evidence-based interventions to reduce stigma and discrimination against mental, neurological and substance use disorders
• Attributes of a programme for successful and sustainable community-based mental health care delivery
• Implementation of research to inform cervical cancer interventions in the Region
Universal health coverage, primary health care, health systems
• Role of PHC in COVID-19 in the Region and how it could be strengthened by building resilient PHC at national and sub-national levels
• Role of community engagement in implementing integrated people-centred health services
• Establishing country relevant “models of care” to enhance service coverage on the path to UHC
• Making UHC happen at country level: push and pull factors
• Integrating Essential Public Health Functions in PHC in the Region
Healthier populations
• Determinants and gaps in quality of care for newborns and child health care at the facility level
• Assessment of maternal and perinatal deaths surveillance system at the country level
• Effect of adopting the WHO ten group classification system in preventing unnecessary use of cesarean section
• Burden of two and three wheelers related traffic injuries in the Eastern Mediterranean Region
• Indoor air quality in public places and its impact on health
Science, information and dissemination
• Influence of COVID-19 on the transformation of health professionals’ education towards the use of digital technologies, including challenges faced and coping strategies during the transition and transformation
• Assessing the degree and extent of use of evidence in national policymaking for health
• Case study to assess research governance (priorities, funding, ethics, standards) at the national level
• Developing and assessing the performance of quantitative indicators that can measure the status of research governance and ethics in countries of different context
• Case studies of institutional processes to enhance multi-concept evidence-informed policy-making processes (as introduced in RC2019)
Country health emergency preparedness and International Health Regulations
• Assessing emergency care systems’ quality of care services in lower middle-income countries in the Region
• Responding to and deploying interventions that protect against infodemics and mitigate their harmful effects
• Systematic review of disaster risk reduction policies; obstacles to risk mitigation in countries of the Region
• Factors to consider in selection and timing of public health measures in the region (impacts of time lag to implement response measures: when should be done/actually implemented)
• Role of the IHR monitoring and evaluation tools and the universal health and preparedness review in assessment of countries’ capacity for public health emergencies preparedness
Infectious hazard preparedness
• Burden of disease assessments for typhoid/other waterborne diarrhoeal diseases
• Threat of emerging and re-emerging zoonotic diseases in the Region: country response and lessons learnt
• Intervention community field studies to improve uptake of risk communication and community engagement for outbreak response
• Enhancing critical/ICU care capacities and life-saving skills among front-line health care workers in fragile, conflict-affected and vulnerable countries
• Barriers and enablers of use of seasonal influenza vaccines among health care workers
Health emergency information and risk assessment
• Landscape assessment of the surveillance systems in countries of the Region to identify the opportunities, gaps, and ways forward for the establishment/strengthening of event-based surveillance
• Rapid review of monitoring and evaluation systems and their robustness for monitoring emergency response during the COVID-19 pandemic.
