Request for Proposals to Document Contributions of NGOS & Civil Society to CORE Group Polio Project

Deadline: 17 March 2017

The CORE Group Polio Project (CGPP), funded by USAID and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, is seeking proposals to support the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) in six countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, India, Nigeria, Somalia and South Sudan.

Activities are implemented by individual US-based private voluntary organizations (PVOs) and local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and overseen at the country level by a national CORE Group Secretariat.

This is an application for front-line practitioners, NGO staff, academics, researchers and others to author peer-reviewed scholarly research articles documenting the contributions of NGOs/civil society and CORE Group Polio Project member NGOs to polio eradication. The purpose of the publication of such articles is to share critical lessons learned in the past 18 years, highlight successes and promote the tools, strategies and innovations developed by CGPP which have relevance for control of other important diseases.

Objectives

• CGPP has introduced and established a number of innovations to global polio eradication which have contributed to the elimination of wild polio virus in high-risk areas.
• Under the CORE Group Secretariat model, a group of NGOs are organized under the umbrella of a national Secretariat office with links to national government and the national coordination body convened for polio eradication at the country level. This approach has proven very successful.
• CGPP introduced the use of community mobilizers to support polio eradication which has become a well-established component of the GPEI.
• CGPP piloted and initiated independent campaign monitoring (ICM) in Angola and continues to conduct ICM in South Sudan.
• CGPP introduced the concept of community-based AFP surveillance which has identified many cases in numerous countries.
• CGPP has championed cross-border collaboration through cross-border meetings and the establishment of cross-border committees. Most importantly, CGPP has consistently promoted and championed the inclusion and contributions of civil society to global polio eradication – by engaging with local communities and their leaders, and by using community mobilizers to reach every home to register newborns, identify unimmunized children, raise awareness about AFP surveillance, and promote immunizations.

Topics

The following proposed topics are deliberately broad in scope to allow for future adjustments:

• Use of community mobilizers for social mobilization to promote health messages, campaign participation, routine immunization and acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) case detection
• Use of community-based AFP surveillance
• Use of community mobilizers to register births and pregnancies
• Use of cross-border collaboration activities
• Development and use of outbreak response plans
• Transition of polio assets, including staff, and community-based programmatic approaches into future health development efforts

Funding Information

A grant of $1,500 will be awarded to each author selected for participation who submits a paper satisfactory for submission to a peer-reviewed journal.

How to Apply

Applicants should present a two-page proposal containing the main objective of the paper, research methods to be used, available data for analysis, a brief biography plus a completed Due Diligence Form provided with this RFP.  Explanation for this form is included within the form attached.

All proposals and papers must be submitted in English.

Applicants must adhere to the journal standards, requirements and deadlines. CGPP staff will provide support and guidance to achieve the objective of the open-access publication.

Inquiries and proposals may be sent to Dr. Henry Perry, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and GCPP Technical Advisor, at hperry2@jhu.edu with a copy to Lydia Bologna at lydia.bologna@crs.org.

For more information, please visit CORE Group Polio Project.