Collaborative Arrangement for the Prevention and Management of Public Health Events in Civil Aviation (CAPSCA)
ICAO continues to collaborate with the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations World Travel Organization (UNWTO), the Centres for Disease Control (CDC), ICAO Member States, CAPSCA partners and Aviation Medical Forum partners (International Federation of Air Line Pilots’ Associations (IFALPA), Airports Council International (ACI), International Air Transport Association (IATA) and International Transport Federation (ITF) on the implementation of the International Health Regulations (IHR) and ICAO Public Health related Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) to mitigate the international spread of diseases and to safeguard international air traffic.
In 2018 ICAO strengthened its working relationship with the World Economic Forum (WEF) by participating in the Epidemics Readiness Accelerator project to improve global health security. ICAO also attended and participated in a high-level conference in Lyon on Preparedness for Public Health Emergencies, which was attended by international organization leaders, State Ministers, mayors of major cities, public health officials and civil as well as private sector leaders. The conference resulted in the “Lyon conference statement on Preparedness for Public Health Emergencies” committing to further cross-sectoral collaboration and ICAO undertaking to explore an agreement between ICAO, UNWTO and WHO to create a joint initiative for collaboration at the interface between public health, international air transport and world tourism.
ICAO responded to four global outbreaks in 2018 (Lassa fever in Nigeria, Plague in Madagascar and two outbreaks of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo) by sharing information and recommendations with CAPSCA partners, sharing flight information with WHO and CDC to assist with response, and further targeted development of the ICAO Infectious Diseases APP, making it available on the ICAO website.
ICAO assisted in building airport capacity to manage communicable diseases arriving on flights by presenting and providing guidelines at a conference hosted by the Airport Cooperative Research Program (ACRP). ICAO also assisted WHO in building State capacity to manage public health emergencies in aviation by participating in and facilitating ”Train the trainer” workshops in the Asia-Pacific (China) and East African (Zimbabwe) regions. A third workshop is scheduled for February 2019 in South Africa.
WHO and ICAO continued to collaborate on vector control mapping and aircraft disinsection initiatives, which resulted in a review of WHO recommendations in July 2018 and a request from WHO to use the ICAO Risk Assessment and Disinsection Decision Making Tool (currently under development by ICAO) as a basis for further development and recommendations. To this end, ICAO will continue to work with its current partners, but will also expand collaboration to additional private organizations such as medical software developers and university research partners.
