On the 18th February 2021, the Ministry of Health (MOH) called a meeting to establish a steering committee to coordinate activities of the National Health Observatory. The meeting held at the WHO Country Office in Eritrea was attended by 15 participants from Ministry of Health; Ministry of National development (statistics office); Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare, Ministry of Land Water and Environment and Ministry of Agriculture, WHO and UNICEF. 

The meeting was opened by DG of Policy and Planning; Dr Berhane Debru and chaired by the DG of Public Health, Dr Andebrhan Tesfazion. This was followed by an introductory presentation on health observatory, its importance for sustainable development goals (SDGs) monitoring, as well as health sector strategies. The key functions of health observatory were highlighted, with the platform providing opportunity for networking, knowledge products sharing, information and statistics production. 

Draft action plan for establishment of a National Health Observatory in Eritrea was presented by Dr Berhane Debru. He outlined how this was derived from the recommendation of the WHO scoping mission in 2018, that assessed the health systems comprehensively, in consultation with line ministries, namely: Ministry of Health, Ministry of National Development, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Land, Water and Environment, Ministry of Finance, and Ministry of Agriculture. Since then, the Ministry of health (MOH) with collaboration with WHO has conducted capacity building of 30 participants. The MOH has nominated a focal person/head for the national health observatory, and allocated office space. The steering committee’s draft terms of reference was briefly presented by Mr Amanuel who shed light on what is expected of of the committee. 

The team agreed on the need for a future meeting for finalization of the steering committee terms of reference as well as those for the technical working group. The importance of integration of data and inter-operability of sources was echoed from the line ministries. In conclusion, the participants and representatives from line ministries were very keen and expressed their commitment for taking the observatory forward.