Short Term Technical Assistants (STTAs): Costing Studies at Malaria Consortium - 12 Openings

Malaria Consortium is one of the world’s leading non-profit organisations specialising in the comprehensive prevention, control and treatment of malaria and other communicable diseases among vulnerable and under privileged populations. We increasingly find our work on malaria can be effectively integrated with other similar public health interventions for greater impact and therefore expanded our remit to include child health and neglected tropical disease interventions.

We are recruiting to fill the following Short Term Technical Assistants (STTAs) positions below:

Job Titles: Coordinator (Supervisor) and Research Assistant

Locations: Abuja & Awka - Anambra
Slots: 1 Supervisor, 2 Research Assistants (Abuja), 9 Research Assistants (Awka)
Duration: January - Febraury, 2023

Purpose / Scope of Assignment

• Malaria Consortium in collaboration with the National Malaria Elimination Programme (NMEP) is planning to implement a campaign to distribute insecticide-treated nets (ITNs) in Anambra State in August 2022. Malaria Consortium will also implement a monitoring and evaluation (M&E) research in relation to the campaign.
• The Anambra Net Campaign M&E Project will gather comprehensive data to assess the outcomes of the campaign in terms of ITN coverage, cost, use rates and net durability, as well as to monitor relevant epidemiological and entomological indicators such as impact on malaria incidence rates reported from a sample of health facilities across the state, vector biting habits and insecticide resistance.
• The consultancy assignment requires execution of the developed study protocol, including the methodology and, use of existing data collection tools for all financial and economic costs incurred in order to distribute ITNs in Anambra State during August 2022. Financial costs cover the actual expenses of running the ITN mass campaign. The economic costs include costs such as donated items and time of volunteers, which are not captured under financial costs.
• We require qualified health economists and field assistants that will carry out financial and economic costing of the universal coverage ITN campaign implemented in Anambra State.

Personnel Required:

• Twelve teams will be required in total: 1 supervisor, 2 research assistants (Abuja), 9 research assistants (Awka).

Specific Tasks
1.) Supervisor:

• Will be responsible for three or four teams of research assistants
• Will be required to attend training prior to survey.
• Leads the team to conduct FGDs/interviews to gather economic cost data and conduct desk reviews to extract financial costs.
• Makes sure that ward level data collection is completed, and the team completes the work in assigned wards.
• Makes sure that LGA data collection is completed, and the team completes the work in a total assigned LGAs within the allocated number of days.
• Ensures data collection in the State and National is completed in the specified number of days.
• Supervises the interview process and resolves any issues, working with the stakeholders at all levels.
• Ensures that the data is collected accurately and shared with the senior health economists and finance analyst.
• Enters financial and economic data using Ms Excel software.
• Ensures data security policy is adhered to.
• Ensures accurate review, validation and submission of data.
• Responsible for ensuring that activities of data collectors are carried out while observing COVID-19 prevention measures and keeping respondents’ data confidential.
• Writes a short report on the team’s achievements, encountered challenges and recommendations.

2.) Research Assistant:

• Will be required to attend training prior to the exercise.
• Carries out data collection in sampled wards, including obtaining written consents, conducting FGDs or KII and administering interviews with all malaria focal persons across health facilities, CBOs/CSOs that supported the campaign in selected wards.
• Support with interview note taking, recording and transcribing.
• Extract different cost data retrospectively from the financial, logistic and operational records kept by Malaria Consortium (both in the Nigeria office and the head office) and across the LGAs, all relevant stakeholders such as SMEP and NMEP involved in the 2022 Anambra State ITN mass campaign.
• Shares completely filled data collection forms at the required frequency according to relevant guidelines.
• Ensures confidentiality of respondents’ personal data during and after interviews.
• Reports to the supervisor any issues and helps to solve problems.
• Support supervisors when necessary, on data entry using Ms Excel software.
• Ensures data security policy is adhered to.

Deliverables

• Training materials and, field guide.
• Activity report.
• A detailed high-quality academic report on the Anambra costing study.

Activity Timelines (January - Febraury, 2023)
Total TA days:

• Coordinator (Supervisors) - 16 days
• Research Assistant (Abuja) - 6 days
• Research Assistant (Akwa) 14 days.

Qualifications and Experience
1.) Supervisor:

• A Post-graduate Degree in Health Sciences.
• At least 5 years’ experience in coordinating household surveys.
• Demonstrated report writing skills for quantitative studies or surveys.
• Good knowledge of the Igbo language.

2.) Research Assistant:

• A minimum of University Degree.
• At least 3 years’ experience in conducting research interviews.
• Good knowledge of the English language.
• Ability to give attention to detail.
• Excellent proficiency in Igbo language.

Application Closing Date
7:59 AM: 30th December, 2022.