Community engagement in epidemics - experiences from the SoNAR-Global COVID-19 vulnerability assessment.
6 affiliations
- 1Department of Social- and Preventive Medicine, Center for Public Health, Medical University of Vienna, Kinderspitalgasse 15, 1St Floor, Vienna, 1090, Austria. [email protected].
- 2Netherlands Institute for Health Services Research (NIVEL), Utrecht, The Netherlands.
- 3Faculty of Behavioural and Social Sciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
- 4University College London - UCL, London, UK.
- 5Institut Pasteur, Paris, France.
- 6Department of Social- and Preventive Medicine, Center for Public Health, Medical University of Vienna, Kinderspitalgasse 15, 1St Floor, Vienna, 1090, Austria.
Abstract
Background
Since the largest outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease 2014-2016, the concept of community engagement (CE) gained popularity in global frameworks and strategies to tackle infectious disease. Recent studies suggest that CE might be a useful approach to understand and resolve vulnerabilities in the light of infectious diseases and other threats to communities across the world. Several guidelines for CE are available. In the SoNAR-Global project we used the UNICEF Minimum Standards for Community Engagement as a lens to examine our CE activities and as a tool to develop a coherent CE methodology with our country partner teams.Methods
With focus-group discussions and semi-structured interviews we supported our teams to plan and implement community-based vulnerability assessment and reduction activities in the context of SoNAR-Global, an international research project carried out in multiple countries simultaneously during the COVID-19 pandemic using an evidence-informed methodology.Results
We describe how the six UNICEF core standards "participation, empowerment and ownership, inclusion, two-way communication, adaptability and localization as well as building on local capacity" were used to harmonize CE activities across country teams at two levels within the SoNAR-Global project: vulnerability assessment (research level) and translation into actionable recommendations (implementation level).Conclusions
For CE activities during pandemics, we suggest considerations towards an adequate definition of community as well as recurring discussions with project partners on the implications of a chosen CE guideline. Structuring CE projects with a Logical Framework Approach (LFA) could facilitate the definition of CE goals at different levels of a project and promotes the use of verifiable indicators, thus supporting measurability as well as evaluation and accountability.
Related
- Vulnerability Assessment: Evidence From A Rural Community-Based Multidimensional Survey in Jharkhand, India
- Rebuilding community trust after attacks on Ebola treatment facilities in DRC: lessons from previous epidemics
- Real-time situational assessment of respiratory virus epidemics in Australia over winter 2025 and an out-of-season influenza A H3N2 epidemic
- The Association of Community Social Vulnerability and Racial Disparities with Infant Preterm Birth and Low Birthweight
- Building recovery capital: co-creating an assets-based community engagement toolkit for people accessing drug and alcohol treatment services
BibTeX
@article{grohma2026community,
title = {{Community engagement in epidemics - experiences from the SoNAR-Global COVID-19 vulnerability assessment.}},
author = {Paul Grohma and Mandy Geise and Jacob Osborne and Michel Dückers and Anna Maria Volkmann and David Napier and Tamara Giles-Vernick and Ruth Kutalek},
journal = {BMC public health},
year = {2026},
month = aug,
doi = {10.1186/s12889-026-28708-z},
url = {https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42958138},
note = {CC BY-NC-ND},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Community engagement in epidemics - experiences from the SoNAR-Global COVID-19 vulnerability assessment.
AU - Paul Grohma
AU - Mandy Geise
AU - Jacob Osborne
AU - Michel Dückers
AU - Anna Maria Volkmann
AU - David Napier
AU - Tamara Giles-Vernick
AU - Ruth Kutalek
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/08/04
JO - BMC public health
DO - 10.1186/s12889-026-28708-z
UR - https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42958138
AB - Background Since the largest outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease 2014-2016, the concept of community engagement (CE) gained popularity in global frameworks and strategies to tackle infectious disease. Recent studies suggest that CE might be a useful approach to understand and resolve vulnerabilities in the light of infectious diseases and other threats to communities across the world. Several guidelines for CE are available. In the SoNAR-Global project we used the UNICEF Minimum Standards for Community Engagement as a lens to examine our CE activities and as a tool to develop a coherent CE methodology with our country partner teams.Methods With focus-group discussions and semi-structured interviews we supported our teams to plan and implement community-based vulnerability assessment and reduction activities in the context of SoNAR-Global, an international research project carried out in multiple countries simultaneously during the COVID-19 pandemic using an evidence-informed methodology.Results We describe how the six UNICEF core standards "participation, empowerment and ownership, inclusion, two-way communication, adaptability and localization as well as building on local capacity" were used to harmonize CE activities across country teams at two levels within the SoNAR-Global project: vulnerability assessment (research level) and translation into actionable recommendations (implementation level).Conclusions For CE activities during pandemics, we suggest considerations towards an adequate definition of community as well as recurring discussions with project partners on the implications of a chosen CE guideline. Structuring CE projects with a Logical Framework Approach (LFA) could facilitate the definition of CE goals at different levels of a project and promotes the use of verifiable indicators, thus supporting measurability as well as evaluation and accountability.
SN - 1471-2458
ER -