Designation: Zonal Coordinator, Dengue
No. of opening: 6
Location: Bengaluru
Overview:
The Clinton Health Access Initiative, Inc. (CHAI) is a global health organization committed to our mission of saving lives and reducing the burden of disease in low-and middle-income countries. We work at the invitation of governments to support them and the private sector to create and sustain high-quality health systems.
CHAI was founded in 2002 in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic with the goal of dramatically reducing the price of life-saving drugs and increasing access to these medicines in the countries with the highest burden of the disease. Over the following two decades, CHAI has expanded its focus. Today, along with HIV, we work in conjunction with our partners to prevent and treat infectious diseases such as COVID-19, malaria, tuberculosis, and hepatitis. Our work has also expanded into cancer, diabetes, hypertension, and other non-communicable diseases, and we work to accelerate the rollout of lifesaving vaccines, reduce maternal and child mortality, combat chronic malnutrition, and increase access to assistive technology. We are investing in horizontal approaches to strengthen health systems through programs in human resources for health, digital health, and health financing. With each new and innovative program, our strategy is grounded in maximizing sustainable impact at scale, ensuring that governments lead the solutions, that programs are designed to scale nationally, and learnings are shared globally.
At CHAI, our people are our greatest asset, and none of this work would be possible without their talent, time, dedication and passion for our mission and values. We are a highly diverse team of enthusiastic individuals across 40 countries with a broad range of skillsets and life experiences. CHAI is deeply grounded in the countries we work in, with majority of our staff based in program countries.
WJCF is an Indian not-for-profit entity, registered under Section 8 of the Indian Companies Act 2013, and has an affiliation agreement with the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI). Our mission is to save lives and improve health outcomes in the country by enabling the government and private sector to strengthen and sustain quality health systems. WJCF has partnered with the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare and state health departments since 2007, providing technical and operational support across key health priorities, including infectious diseases (COVID-19, hepatitis, HIV, TB, vector-borne diseases), non-communicable diseases (cervical cancer, diabetes, sickle cell disease), maternal and child health (anaemia, immunisation, diarrhoea, pneumonia), sexual and reproductive health, health insurance and digital health (AB PM-JAY, ABDM), oxygen and hypoxemia management, safe drinking water, and climate and health.
Programme Overview:
Dengue has emerged as the world’s most widespread, rapidly increasing and outbreak prone vector borne disease with a historic high of 14.6 million cases and ~12,000 deaths reported in 2024. Modelling studies however estimate ~390 Mn infections per year, with a majority of such cases being asymptomatic or misdiagnosed as febrile illness, contributing to under estimation of the true disease burden.
India is amongst the 30 most endemic countries for Dengue. While the National Centre for Vector Borne Disease Control (NCVBDC) under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare reported 233,519 cases and 297 deaths in 2024, modelling studies estimate the prevalence of Dengue in India is 56.9%, translating to ~13-33 million annual infections, which cause ~0.12% of total deaths, or ~11,400 deaths.
Dengue is also characterized as a disease of urbanization, with its prevalence closely linked to high population density, poor housing quality, proximity to garbage collection/dumping sites and open drains, which are typical descriptors of urban poor and marginalized communities, who in turn bear a disproportionate burden of the disease. India is set to add more than 130 million urban inhabitants by 2035, with 49% living in slums in 2020, 2.4-40.7% not having piped water, 22.1-96.1% not having a connection to sewerage, and 27.6-68.1% not having sufficient living area.
Climate change and associated extreme weather events further exacerbate the challenge of managing Dengue. Dengue is a recognized Climate-Sensitive Infectious Disease, with its climate linkages mediated by fluctuations in temperature, precipitation, relative humidity, wind velocity, climate modes such as ENSO and extreme weather events, which in turn hold the potential to favour mosquito breeding, survival and feeding leading to wider spread, extended transmission windows, and unpredictable outbreaks.
Project Background:
Conventional disease surveillance and management systems are programmed to be reactive, lack integration with data on climate change determinants along with lack of predictive, hyperlocal geospatially informed risk insights. The public health led response also does not sufficiently leverage private sector for diagnostics and case management along with communities for preventive public health action. These end up limiting the system’s ability to anticipate and prepare for emerging shifts in disease burden, implementation of targeted interventions and leads to avoidable morbidity and resource strain.
To address these evolving complexities, WJCF, in collaboration with Artpark @ IISc, with support from the Asian Venture Philanthropy Network (AVPN) and India Health Fund (IHF), is operationalizing an initiative for climate linked, predictive, spatial risk informed surveillance and disease management in the city of Bengaluru.
The solution has been designed as an integrated package that brings together a digital platform, a framework of interventions for integration into governance systems, and multi-pronged approaches to engage the private sector and at-risk communities, with particular emphasis on vulnerable groups. Together, these components provide a replicable and scalable approach to addressing key gaps in dengue surveillance and case management, while consistently applying a climate lens.
Position Summary:
The Zonal Coordinator, based out of Bengaluru, will play a pivotal role in working with urban ward committee representatives, local health and municipal officials, local private healthcare providers in designing, implementing and monitoring the various components of the initiative. They will support the Strategy Associate and the WJCF and Artpark projects teams with rigorous field-based insights to improve overall performance of the initiative.
WJCF is seeking a highly motivated, results-oriented individual with demonstrated leadership skills and outstanding analytical skills. The ideal candidate must have excellent communications skills and be able to independently drive engagement and work closely with a diverse range of officials and stakeholders to oversee project implementation. We place great value on relevant qualities such as resourcefulness, responsibility, tenacity, energy, and work ethic.
Responsibilities:
- Develop robust liaising with zonal municipal corporation functionaries, health workers, urban ward committee representatives
- Serve as a Single Point of Contact (SPOC) for implementation of project-related interventions in the zone.
- Develop localized expertise and on the zone’s health system architecture (public and private), infrastructure, demographics and socio-economic landscape.
- Conduct orientation and refresher training workshops for health workers on reporting on hotspots via PRISM-H app
- Support in micro-planning for digitized breeding surveys by health workers, undertake continuous monitoring of app usage and support data quality checks (via dashboards and spot checks)
- Support zonal municipal functionaries to operationalize urban ward committees and Rapid Response Teams (RRTs)
- Support urban ward committees to prepare ward level graded action plans and RRT micro plans
- Engage private sector providers and lab service providers via physical meets, hybrid workshops, working groups, round table discussions and outreach through digital media.
- Support zonal municipal functionaries in designing targeted IEC campaigns. Leveraging collaterals developed at the BBMP, the coordinators will identify high risk groups and zones along with appropriate media of messaging supported by a thematic calendar of activities.
Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree in public health, Social Work, Environmental studies, Management or a related field.
- 5+ years of experience in field operations, programme management and community engagement (preferably in health, social development or urban governance).
- Prior experience working with municipal corporations, ward committees, or local self-government institutions is desirable.
- Strong stakeholder management skills, ability to build rapport with municipal officials, community groups, and local private providers.
- Experience conducting trainings or capacity-building workshops for health workers, community volunteers, or frontline staff.
- Proficiency in MS Office Suite (Excel, Word, PowerPoint); comfort with digital tools for field reporting and coordination.
- Strong written and oral communication skills in English and Kannada.
Note: This will on 3rd Party Payroll
Form Link to Zonal Coordinator, Dengue – Here