Data Analyst (Consultant)

Background

The Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC), established in 1986, is a non-profit, autonomous, regional organization, international in status and non-political in management, staffing, and operations. ADPC has been created for scientific, educational, developmental, and humanitarian purposes that work to build the resilience of people and institutions to disasters and climate change impacts in Asia and the Pacific region. ADPC has more than 34 years of working experience in Asia along with the national and local Governments of its founding charter member countries as well as countries of the Regional Consultative Committee (RCC) on Disaster Management. ADPC works to strengthen disaster risk reduction at all levels, from regional to national, sub-national, and even to community levels. ADPC aims at supporting governments, strengthen institutions, and build capacity for mainstreaming DRR into development processes. It includes developing institutional systems, assessing disaster risks, undertaking programs for disaster risk reduction and adapting to climate change, etc. Further details on ADPC and its programs can be found at www.adpc.net.

ADPC is currently implementing two programs, namely “Program for Strengthening Preparedness for Emergency Response and Recovery in India (PROSPER-India): and “COVID- 19: PROSPER-India Program Support to Bihar Government (INCOV)” in Bihar, India with financial support from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. PROSPER-India is a three-year program focusing on providing technical support to the Government of Bihar in the implementation of DRR activities identified in the Bihar DRR Roadmap (2015-2030). The India COVID-19 Grant is being implemented from June 2020 – March 2021 to strengthen the emergency preparedness and response functions of the Government of Bihar (GoB) for COVID-19. These efforts are primarily targeted at the Disaster Management Department (DMD) and Department of Health (DoH) of Government of Bihar for strengthening Emergency Operations Centers for Response, Risk Communication, and Awareness-raising and enhanced Knowledge Management for COVID preparedness.

Statement of Intent

Safer communities and sustainable development through disaster risk reduction. Page | 2 Under the output on “Disaster preparedness actions for Agriculture, Health and DM sectors consolidated and scaled up in high-risk districts of Bihar state,” one of the proposed activities is to strengthen the Public Health Emergency Operations and management system of the Government of Bihar. The services of a consultant are required to work with the ADPC team in Bihar to assist the Department of Health and Disaster Management Department in managing emergencies, including the current crisis of COVID-19 in Bihar. The person is expected to work with government officials deployed at the Health Emergency Operation Center (HEOC), the Integrated Operation Center (IOC) and the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP), DoH, on data analysis for managing public health emergencies, through HEOC/war room of DoH/State Health Society Bihar (SHSB) in Bihar. This consultant position is open for Indian Nationals only. The position is based in Patna, Bihar State of India.

Qualifications and Experience

• Master’s degree in statistics, data analytics, applied research, or any other relevant discipline from a recognized university with excellent command over English.
• Knowledge of GIS applications desirable.
• Proven ability and experience of five years in quantitative and qualitative data analysis and GIS mapping.
• Working experience and additional qualifications in Disaster Management, Public Health, understanding of Disaster Communication, and Early Warning Systems, shape-files would be preferred.

Personal Qualities:

• Self-motivated, pro-active and takes initiatives;
• Demonstrated ability to plan, and organize work & time independently;
• Verbal and written communication skills in English, knowledge, and the ability to speak in Hindi are essential.
• Excellent interpersonal skills, team-oriented work style, and experience in working in a multi-cultural environment;
• Strong networking capacity and understanding of development work at national and regional levels;
• Strong desires to learn, undertake new challenges including working during COVID-19 outbreak, must be a creative problem-solver, and must have self-confidence;
• Willingness to work hard, good sense of humor but with seriousness about the quality and excellence of work.

Purpose of the assignment

Safer communities and sustainable development through disaster risk reduction. The primary purpose of the assignment is to extend support to the Department of Health and Disaster Management Department in data analytics for managing the emergency operations of the current crisis of COVID-19. Duties and Responsibilities: Under the overall technical guidance of Program Managers, ADPC and HEOC Nodal Officer, the consultant shall be responsible for working with government officials deployed at HEOC, IOC and IDSP, DoH on data analysis for managing public health emergencies, through HEOC/war room of DoH/State Health Society Bihar (SHSB) including the current spread of COVID-19 in Bihar. Specific tasks will include:

• Collect and integrate data from existing data points; collate/validate the same from various primary and secondary sources of IDSP/IHIP, Call center 104, and data center of SHSB to develop daily reports.
• Analyze data and draw appropriate action-oriented inferences along the lines of geographical spread, age, gender, predisposing factors, occupational and other health determinants.
• Analyze and project trends based on correlations between emerging data sets about the spread of COVID-19 in Bihar. These could include parameters such as number of tests based on test types conducted daily, number of positive cases, patients in different level of COVID care facilities, mortality trends, etc.
• Contribute to the existing decision support system of GoB by mapping emerging/anticipated demand against the existing capacity of appropriate health care services in Bihar and prepare recommendations based on the analysis.
• Serve as surge capacity at HEOC/IOC.
• Any other task assigned by the Program Manager, PROSPER-India, ADPC.
• Submit a completion report of tasks carried out, key learnings, and recommendations for the way forward.

Key deliverables

• Daily analysis of quantitative and qualitative data and GIS mapping of the same for management of COVID-19 operations by DoH.
• Maintenance of epidemiological database, analysis of meta data for COVID-19 spread to draw lessons for future policy formulation.
• Analysis of data for operational decision making in disease containment, vaccination and preparation of reports.
• Surge capacity at HEOC/IOC.
• Completion report.

Reporting Relationship

In performing the duties and responsibilities indicated above, the consultant will be supervised by the assigned Program Manager, under the overall guidance of the Director, Preparedness for Response and Recovery (PRR) Department of ADPC. The consultant will closely work with ADPC program team and concerned officials of DoH, GoB.