The National outbreak response handbook by the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN) provides national public health agencies, ministries of health and partners with practical guidance as they respond to outbreaks in their country or territory. The Handbook can be used to inform outbreak preparedness and response plans at the national and subnational levels, including to ensure complementarity with existing national outbreak response plans. It summarizes effective organizational structures that can be implemented during national outbreak response, highlights best practices based on GOARN partners’ collective experiences, and references key technical and operational resources that have been developed by GOARN and its partners. This version (2024) of Handbook has been developed following extensive consultation across multidisciplinary GOARN partners and WHO technical teams, including collective response experiences. It is accompanied by an online portal version on the GOARN Knowledge Platform.

This document elaborates on the strategic grouping approach adopted by the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN), focusing on its conceptual and operational aspects. The strategic grouping approach refers to convening partners to work together on mutual technical interests towards strategic goals, and to strengthen collaboration and coordination, promote participation and to deliver common priority Network activities. It is an approach that provides guidance and opportunities for partners to help them better engage in GOARN’s activities at the national and regional levels.

This document enhances the accountability, transparency and efficiency of GOARN, thereby ensuring that responses can occur and be coordinated rapidly in times of need. By setting out terms of reference and decision-making structures, the framework assists partners and stakeholders in making informed decisions and taking effective coordinated action. The GOARN Governance Framework is a significant achievement in defining the way we work together as a global network, and it will continue to evolve as we strive to provide the best technical support to the communities we serve.

The GOARN 2022–2026 Strategy Implementation Plan is a derivative product which follows the GOARN 2022-2026 Strategy. The Implementation Plan is intended to define and present, in a systematic manner and in alignment with GOARN’s areas of work, how the Strategy will be implemented. The Implementation Plan outlines the activities which contribute to GOARN projects and areas of work, and provides timelines for how these will be implemented through to the end of the Strategy.

This document outlines the recommendations/considerations for the GOARN Strategy 2022-2026. Strategy recommendations were developed to shape and define the future directions of the Network through an extensive strategy development process involving interviews with key stakeholders, a survey to GOARN partners, scenario-building workshops, a strategic workshop at the GOARN Global Meeting of Partners, regional consultations with regional focal points and partners, and meetings/workshops with Steering Committee Members to refine and finalize. The Strategy document will be implemented by the GOARN Steering Committee and GOARN partners.

An accessible and diverse resource for infectious disease outbreak response. For too long, the theory and practice of infectious disease outbreak response have been the domain of a small number of experienced responders. The COVID-19 pandemic brought global attention to the requirements of effective outbreak response, and the need for preparation across the key pillars. Decisionmakers, early career practitioners, and those in the field now have access to a comprehensive text that brings together evidence-based and practical insights from the best in the business. Dale Fisher, Professor of Medicine at the National University of Singapore, was chair of WHO's Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network before and during most of the pandemic. In this massive collaborative effort, he marshals nearly one hundred top public health leaders and experts from the front lines to present thirty-seven chapters on pandemic preparedness and response, drawing heavily on experiences from COVID-19, but also from Ebola, MERS, SARS-1, influenza, and other outbreaks of modern times. The contributors include experts from health ministries and Centres for Disease Control and national public health institutions around the world; from international organizations like the WHO, MSF, IFRC, and UNICEF; and research institutions and various NGOs from dozens of countries, adding to the diversity and richness of the descriptions.

The emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in late 2002 and 2003 challenged the global public health community to confront a novel epidemic that spread rapidly from its origins in southern China until it had reached more than 25 other countries within a matter of months. In addition to the number of patients infected with the SARS virus, the disease had profound economic and political repercussions in many of the affected regions. Recent reports of isolated new SARS cases and a fear that the disease could reemerge and spread have put public health officials on high alert for any indications of possible new outbreaks. This report examines the response to SARS by public health systems in individual countries, the biology of the SARS coronavirus and related coronaviruses in animals, the economic and political fallout of the SARS epidemic, quarantine law and other public health measures that apply to combating infectious diseases, and the role of international organizations and scientific cooperation in halting the spread of SARS. The report provides an illuminating survey of findings from the epidemic, along with an assessment of what might be needed in order to contain any future outbreaks of SARS or other emerging infections.