MSF – A Brief History
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) provides assistance to populations in distress, victims of natural or man-made disasters, and to victims of armed conflict. They do this regardless of gender, race or religion, creed, political convictions, or gender.
MSF adheres to neutrality and impartiality for the sake of universal medical ethics, and the right and obligation to provide humanitarian assistance.
MSF-Brazil is home to a highly active team of 220 people. F2F teams are available (approx. 120 people are employed in 5 cities. One of the 31 MSF offices worldwide, bringing together human and financial resources to support MSF projects across more than 70 countries. With its Brazilian Medical Unit, we expect to increase our operational support capacity over the next 2 years. MSF-Brazil’s main office is located in Rio de Janeiro with a growing support office in São Paulo and has its activities funded by more than 500,000 Brazilian donors. MSF-Brazil sent 191 Brazilian workers to various projects around the world in 2019.
BRAMU is an independent unit of MSF that is funded and accountable by MSF-Brazil’s Directorate. It is integrated into the OC Brussel Medical Department while still allowing for regional initiatives and innovative approaches.
This position will be based at BRAMU. Support will be provided in the Latin America region, and possibly a second. This position is part the Operational Center Brussels’ (OCB), Environmental Health Unit team.
OBJECTIVE:
The objective of the project is to support operations while interlinking current MSF field realities and challenges, methods of intervention, and models to aid in response and intervention.
We need an expert in environmental health (EH), arboviruses, and practical experience to assist field teams with the consequences of environmental degradation and its effect on diseases.
RESPONSIBILITIES:
Operational and strategic functions
• Include environmental determinants of health into the programmatic and strategic analysis of MSF interventions and correlate them to the MSF field response, strategic orientations, and operational approaches.
• Define and design the most adapted and relevant practices to respond to the environmental health (EH) needs of populations and patients by applying the socio-ecological lens.
• Monitor arboviruses in the region, and help field teams develop contingency plans to respond to potential outbreaks.
Field support
• Conduct field visits to support assessment, analysis, and implementation of quality environmental health interventions.
• Participate in exploratory missions, emergencies (in an advisory, operational, and support capacity), program support visits, and project committee meetings
• Support EH HR through briefings, training, coaching, on technical and management aspects
• Collaborate with the medical teams in the concerned operational unit and relevant medical department referents to provide strategic direction to the field.
• Coordinate or carry out needs assessments and give expert advice regarding program set-up.
• Support field innovation, capitalization, and sharing with the Environmental Health unit.
• Support advocacy strategies both at the field level at international levels; through data analysis, problem or needs identification, and technical advice in terms of the proposed solutions.
• Recommend transversal integrated environmental health strategies in every project, when relevant.
Data, information, training
• Contribute to the development and update of EH indicators (EHI) and data collection tools for EHI to help professionals who are not experts in the subject to accurately monitor the phenomena of environmental Health in target populations.
• Produce and adapt analysis in close collaboration with/for MSF operations in the field, cells, and departments to bring observations, ideas, reflections, and analysis to improve and advise MSF interventions and positioning
• Participate in the development/revision of policies, guidelines, protocols, tools, and other strategic papers in the field of environmental health.
• Identify major gaps in environmental health approaches or perception in MSF and recommend strategies to address these.
• Produce training in collaboration with medical departments and external experts on main regional arbovirus outbreaks.
• Link regional problems and events to global trends and bring different experiences to similar problems from other continents.
• Develop in partnership with other MSF colleagues an intra-organizational training on Environmental Health, aiming to raise awareness and increase knowledge of the environmental determinants of health.
Field research and advocacy
• Conduct intervention research to generate knowledge, theory, and practices that aim to influence risk factors to direct environmental health effects.
• To reflect on new tools and surveys that could help and allow to monitor and documenting events and social determinants of environmental health in the contexts where MSF intervenes and in field missions
• Contribute to the development of operational field research in collaboration with advocacy, and analysis unitS, operational departments, and external partners.
Partnerships and communities for practice
• Collaborate and work closely with MSF EH, water and sanitation, entomologists, planetary health, nutrition, outbreak referents, movement-wide
• Collaborate with other referents in medical departments and operations on subjects of common interest: one health, planetary health, and environmental footprint.
• Build a relevant network of experts in planetary and environmental health, as much as on emerging diseases.
• Develop partnerships and collaboration with external communities of practice in the academy, external organizations, and research institutes.
EDUCATION:
• Degree in a relevant field
• Studies in Ecology is an asset
• Master’s Degree or Higher (desirable)
EXPERIENCE IN
• health & environmental interventions
• Qualitative research or action research methodology
• Knowledge and sensitivity towards traditional peoples
• Field experience (recommended)
• MSF experience is an asset
LANGUAGES:
• English spoken and written: proficiency mandatory
• Portuguese or Spanish: spoken mandatory
KEY SKILLS
• Programmatic thinking is a must
• Ability to produce reports and protocols
• Coaching attitude and skills
BASIC COMPETENCIES
• Commitment to MSF Principles
• Strategic Vision
• Results and Quality Orientation
• Teamwork and Cooperation