COVID-19 Digital Classroom Courses

Over the past 15 years, counties have implemented a wide range of promising digital health interventions. Country governments have increasingly realized that in order to have scalable, sustainable, and interoperable digital health systems, a government-led, coordinated approach is required. 

The course, Digital Health: Planning National Systems, is designed to empower ministry leadership with the technical concepts and planning tools necessary to steer and orient national digital health stakeholders. 

The curriculum has been developed by USAID, Digital Square, TechChange, and Last Mile Health and is based on content compiled by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). It features critical technical concepts, existing best practices, and pragmatic methods, all framed according to the national planning cycle that Ministry of Health officials manage.

This document will take you through key considerations and resources when adapting the COVID-19 course series to meet the needs of your own context.

The first course in this series focuses on building core knowledge, skills, and attitudes around reducing the risk of contracting and spreading COVID-19, and how to protect yourself and your community. 

Topics covered in this course include:

• Basic information on COVID-19 (i.e., where it comes from and how it spreads), 
• Vulnerable groups
• Misinformation around COVID-19
• Recognizing signs and symptoms
• Prevention strategies
• Referral and management of suspected and confirmed cases.

This course covers COVID-19 spread prevention and how you can protect yourself and your community from contracting it. The course focuses on practical ways to practice these behaviors in a variety of different contexts, including in communal spaces, at home, and at health facilities. It discusses how the community can work together to prevent outbreaks of COVID-19 and slow the spread of the disease, so that hospitals do not become overwhelmed with cases. 

It is important to note that while this course provides a generalized overview of COVID-19 prevention and protection measures that are widely applicable to a variety of contexts and circumstances, this course does not account for everything, especially as the health community is still learning day-to-day about the virus and its impact. Therefore, please use this course as a guide, and continue to familiarize yourself with your context to best customize the content we cover here for you and your community’s specific needs.

This course will cover the mental health impact of COVID-19, and how a combination of psychosocial support systems and a wellness perspective can be used to mitigate the effects of the highly disruptive, stressful, and disorienting COVID-19 pandemic. While our focus at this time may be more on physical health and wellbeing, it is vital that we do not overlook the importance of addressing mental health concerns, particularly given the potentially traumatic effect of the pandemic across communities and especially for health workers and other vulnerable populations. 

It is important to note that while this course provides a generalized overview of COVID-19’s effect on mental health and wellness, there are differences across countries and contexts. There must not be a one-size-fits-all approach to addressing the mental health and psychosocial needs of the population. Therefore, please use this course as a guide, and continue to familiarize yourself with your context in order to best customize the content we cover here for you and your community’s specific needs. 

The goal of this course is to help community-based health workers become familiar with the process and skills involved in contact tracing. In this course, we will cover the purpose of contact tracing, which involves identifying, assessing, and managing people who have been exposed to COVID-19 to prevent its transmission. We will cover the steps involved, including how to assess your contacts’ level of risk and how to provide them with the support they need.

The goal of this course is to provide community-based health workers with guidance on how to advise community members on home-based care for COVID-19. This course identifies community-based health workers as people working to address the public health of their communities (for example, community health workers, community health volunteers, health facility workers, health educators / trainers, and health project managers). 

The course will cover how to determine eligibility criteria for home-based care and isolation. We will also cover how to support people with COVID-19 in their homes if they meet these criteria, including virtual support (telehealth) and support from their caregivers.

The goal of this course is to provide community-based health workers with a comprehensive understanding of community-based surveillance and their role in it. Community-based surveillance is a rapid and effective system for monitoring your community's health during a public health crisis, such as COVID-19. It is a great way to track events and behaviors that could lead to an increase in COVID-19 cases. This course will walk you through the community-based surveillance workflow, including your responsibilities as a community-based health worker in supporting the data collection and dissemination of information during this pandemic.