Short-term health system responses to epidemics across hard-to-reach areas in sub-Saharan Africa: A scoping review protocol

Abstract

Epidemics and disease outbreaks are the occurrence of cases of disease in excess of what would be normally expected. Epidemic-prone diseases, including emerging and re-emerging diseases, constitute the greatest threat to public health security and disruption of social and economic development. When cases of epidemics are diagnosed in specific areas, an outbreak response is triggered to stop the spread swiftly, keeping as few people as possible from being infected. In the past 20 years, the sub-Saharan region has witnessed a marked increase in the number of outbreaks in pandemics, such as cholera, dengue, A/H5N 1 influenza, and rift valley fever, among others. And while many of the efforts toward containment have been individually studied, we have no recent studies that examine them collectively in order to draw appropriate comparisons, no recent studies that have especially focused on hard-to-reach areas, and none that have applied a health systems lens. This study thus details a scoping review of short-term health system responses to epidemics across hard-to-reach areas in sub-Saharan Africa.