Workshop on seasonal influenza public health programmes brings together professionals from 19 European countriesArchived

From 8 to 10 October, senior public health professionals from 19 European countries participated in the third ‘training of trainers’ workshop organised by ECDC in Stockholm on “Development of public health programmes for prevention and control of seasonal influenza”. Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Slovak Republic, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey were represented in this workshop, targeted at professionals running, developing or planning to develop immunisation programmes for prevention of seasonal influenza.

In support of the Council Recommendation on seasonal influenza vaccination (2009), the workshop aimed to encourage Member States to improve seasonal influenza coverage and foster education, training and information exchange on seasonal influenza and vaccination. Particular importance was given to finding strategies to increase vaccination coverage in two important groups:

• older people
• health care workers

The training was organized by ECDC in collaboration with the University of Chester, UK. Topics included:

• Human seasonal influenza programme planning
• Surveillance systems and epidemiological studies
• Laboratory issues
• Human seasonal influenza policy
• Vaccination
• Targeting priority groups
• Communication
• Evaluation of public health programmes on seasonal influenza
• Action planning

Participants were invited to re-use the training materials of the workshop to provide training in their countries at national or sub-national level.  ECDC encourages further dissemination of these materials among trainers and experts in public health programmes development and the organisation of similar courses at national and sub-national level.