Western Pacific regional engagement 
in the Emergency Medical Team Global Meeting 2024

Abstract

Full text

The 6th Emergency Medical Team (EMT) Global Meeting was held in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on 5–7 November 2024. (1) This was the largest EMT Global Meeting to date, with over 1300 participants from more than 140 countries across all six regions of the World Health Organization (WHO). Discussions focused on health emergency response, coordination, lessons identified, best practices and future advancements in EMTs. The WHO Western Pacific Region was the second most represented region attending the meeting, with over 100 participants from 23 of the 37 countries and areas in the Region. The Western Pacific is home to 16 WHO-classified EMTs, and almost every country or area in the Region has a national and/or international EMT. The meeting provided an opportunity for participants to share, collaborate with and learn from colleagues both regionally and globally.

Participants and representatives from the Region actively contributed to various panels, discussions, working sessions and abstract presentations during the 3-day meeting. The EMT Global Meeting’s core theme was the implementation of the EMT 2030 strategy, expanding on the minimum standards set in the Classification and minimum standards for emergency medical teams. (2, 3) A half-day Western Pacific Regional Meeting was held on the first day to bring together EMT members from the Region to celebrate successes, share lessons identified and plan for future nationally led, regionally supported health emergency responses.

The Western Pacific Region was well represented throughout the EMT Global Meeting (Table 1). EMT members from the Region presented in almost every plenary, technical and research-focused session (Table 2). Over 200 abstracts were submitted from 58 different countries for presentation. Of the 32 oral abstracts accepted for presentation, 13 were from the Region (Table 2), while 22 additional research abstracts were accepted for poster/digital presentation from the Region. Mercy Malaysia, Singapore Ministry of Health EMT and three teams from the Philippine Emergency Medical Assistance Team were recognized as newly classified international EMTs. The Australian Medical Assistance Team, New Zealand Medical Assistance Team and Japan Disaster Relief Team were recognized for their reclassification.

Over 100 governmental and nongovernmental EMT representatives from more than 21 countries and areas attended the meeting’s regional session, which included the nomination of a new Regional Chair Group and a “world café” session to engage participants in shaping the future regional response. The Western Pacific Regional Group nominated and selected the new Regional Chair Group: Incoming Chair – Philippines; Outgoing Vice-Chair – Samoa; Incoming Vice-Chair – Papua New Guinea; and Nongovernmental Representative – Pasifika Medical Association.

The world café session focused on eight thematic topics covering national, regional and international deployments, interoperability, EMT logistics, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), specialization, training and the impacts of climate change on emergency response. Key takeaways from the regional session emphasized the need to expand collaborative training, including topic-specific training and exercises for EMT logistics, WASH, sustainable practices, EMT coordination and climate change actions. Participants from the Region endorsed the creation of an online platform for EMTs and members to mainstream collaboration and sharing. They emphasized the need to continue strengthening interoperability, national EMTs, national EMT governance, and subregionalization with a common training content, common cache, regular joint exercises and common information management systems.

The EMT Global Meeting served as a valuable platform for teams to share operational experiences and engage in strategic discussions on the future growth of the EMT initiative, (4) which aims to enhance the speed and quality of national and international EMT responses. Dialogue from the meeting will help shape regional priorities for health emergency preparedness and response moving forward. A key benefit of such gatherings is the opportunity for participants to build relationships and trust before collaborating during a health emergency response. The meeting highlighted the successes in the Western Pacific Region and continued progress towards a more mature, integrated approach to emergency medical response.