INCREASE-project Corona Workshop Series: Knowledge Exchange in Virtual Workshops on the SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic
Since February 2021, a four-year BMBF-funded project titled “INCREASE – Inclusive and Integrated Multi-Hazard Risk Management and Engagement of Volunteers to INCREASE Societal Resilience in Times of Climate Change” has brought together a total of 20 partner institutions from natural and social sciences, technology, and practice in Iran and Germany, coordinated by the Disaster Research Unit (DRU) at the Freie Universität Berlin.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the health situation in both countries and worldwide, the INCREASE-project has proposed a series of virtual workshops devoted to discussing about ongoing developments of the COVID-19 pandemic with a special focus on relevant aspects for the context of Integrated Disaster Risk Management (IDRM). These two-hour workshops will bring together experts from Iran and Germany.
The series start with a workshop that provides a more general introduction to the health and civil protection systems in both countries – i.e., organization, infrastructures, strategies, responsibilities, management of health and vaccination against COVID-19, among others. This aims to create the basis for more specific discussions in the subsequent workshops. The topics of the following workshops will address the social aspects of vaccination (including vaccination hesitancy, group-related inequalities in accessibility, and the like), risk communication (including motivation/mobilization), and logistics and volunteering. In sum, we start with conversations on the framework conditions (first workshop), continue with a better understanding of the problem (second), and finally move on to practical solutions (subsequent workshops). In addition to previous and ongoing debates, which have mainly revolved around procurement and, in some cases, also around vaccine safety, we have observed that achieving high vaccination rates will be one of the main societal challenges in the foreseeable future. In this regard, the main goal for these workshops is to discuss such current and expected challenges, and to initiate a corresponding network of experts.
Concluded workshops
- First (Kick-off) Workshop on 30.08.2021. Introductory conversation on the COVID-19 situation in Iran and Germany: National health and emergency systems.
- Second Workshop on 21.02.2022. Social aspects of vaccination against COVID-19.
- Third Workshop on 23.05.2022. Risk Communication during the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran and Germany.
