UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.
Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.
And we never give up.
Out of 120 countries which have introduced HPV vaccine in their national immunization programmes so far, 26 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) were supported by Gavi since 2018. At least 20 more LMICs are planning to introduce in the next couple of years. However, HPV vaccination coverage is low compared to the other childhood vaccines due to a mix of reasons. These include earlier supply constraints, pandemic backsliding, suboptimal outreach to schools and remote rural and conflict/humanitarian settings, gender-related barriers, low public demand and trust, and weak touchpoints of the adolescent age group with primary health care. Based on the need to accelerate progress to achieve global cervical cancer elimination by 2030, Gavi Alliance adopted the HPV Programme Revitalization 2023-2025. The programme aims further scale up the number of countries and the vaccination coverage, reaching 86 M girls in LMICs with HPV vaccination by 2025.
UNICEF has decades of experience in supporting immunization worldwide and has actively contributed the LMICs to conduct HPV demonstration projects before Gavi approved nationwide introductions. UNICEF has accelerated support to HPV vaccination from 2018 through its Headquarters, Regional and Country Offices and leveraging its presence in every country as a core Alliance partner. Through the multi-partner collaboration mechanism at the global level, UNICEF assumed the lead role for social and behaviour change and immunization supply chain in HPV vaccine roll-out, as well as supporting country decision making, development of Gavi applications, and providing technical assistance to strengthen programmatic preparedness, capacity building, mobilizing community networks and Community Health Workers to reach all girls. UNICEF also managed the global HPV vaccine supply and maintained liaison with the manufacturers to ensure a healthy market. We have implemented proof-of-concept projects in two countries to test the multisectoral collaboration through integration of additional adolescent health interventions alongside the HPV vaccine. UNICEF’s Gender Action Plan (GAP) included HPV roll-out as one of the results prioritized reflecting the commitment of the organization. Until 2022 more than 25 countries introduced HPV vaccine nationwide with UNICEF support.
Based on the achievements of its previous work, UNICEF will continue to provide support along the aforementioned programme areas during the HPV Revitalization 2023-2025. In addition to that, the organization is to mobilize additional institutional strengths based on its multi-sectoral capacity as a child rights organization and work across five key programmatic areas to better address 1) Coverage & Equity 2) Demand 3) Gender 4) Innovation 5) Multi-sectoral work & integrated programming for adolescents through collaboration with other teams such as adolescent health, education/school health and nutrition, adolescent development and participation, HIV/AIDS and WASH.
For every child, good mental health….
Under the guidance of the supervisor, the incumbent of this position supports the Immunization Section in HQ in providing day to day assistance to strengthen Regional Office and Country Office capacities to effectively assist countries scaling up HPV vaccine in their national immunization programmes.
How can you make a difference?
Provide guidance, tools, technical assistance and capacity building to regions in supporting countries in planning and implementing HPV vaccine scale-up and to reach the adolescent girls that may be missed due to various equity barriers and pandemic disruptions,
Develop and disseminate programmatic guidance for UNICEF regional and country offices to mobilize multi-sectoral integrated approaches in reaching adolescent girls and share the guidance with partners to inform similar global guidelines.
Support regional and country coordination and decision making for HPV vaccine scale-up through regional coordination mechanisms, Regional Working Groups (RWG), Regional Immunization Technical Advisory Groups (RITAG), national immunization programme managers meetings, and similar events).
Support establishing consultant rosters and similar tools as needed to assist regions and countries in timely identifying and deploying the suitable capacity to meet the technical assistance needs for HPV vaccine introduction and coverage improvement.
Document regional and country experiences in introducing and scaling up HPV vaccine as part of the other adolescent interventions, and disseminate good practices and lessons learned in appropriate global and regional fora (Gavi HPV Sub-Team Regional Working Groups, Regional Immunization Technical Advisory Groups, EPI managers meetings, webinars, etc.)
Conduct periodic monitoring of country progress and report UNICEF data to joint monitoring databases and tools of Gavi partners
Any other cross-cutting tasks to support the routine immunization coverage and equity team on new vaccine introduction.
To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…
For every Child, you demonstrate…
UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability (CRITA), and sustainability
Please click Here to view UNICEF's core values and Here to view our competency framework.
UNICEF competencies required for this post are.
UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to including everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.
We offer a wide range of benefits to our staff, a wide range of benefits to our staff, including paid parental leave, breastfeeding breaks, and reasonable accommodation for persons with disabilities. UNICEF strongly encourages the use of flexible working arrangements.
UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority, and discrimination.
UNICEF is committed to promoting the protection and safeguarding of all children. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles.
Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.
UNICEF appointments are subject to medical clearance.
Issuance of a visa by the host country of the duty station, which will be facilitated by UNICEF, is required for IP positions. Appointments may also be subject to inoculation (vaccination) requirements, including against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid).
Government employees that are considered for employment with UNICEF are normally required to resign from their government before taking up an assignment with UNICEF.
UNICEF reserves the right to withdraw an offer of appointment, without compensation, if a visa or medical clearance is not obtained, or necessary inoculation requirements are not met, within a reasonable period for any reason.
“UNICEF only considers higher educational qualifications obtained from an institution accredited/recognized in the World Higher Education Database (WHED), a list updated by the International Association of Universities (IAU) / United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). The list can be accessed at http://www.whed.net/”
For more information on remuneration and benefits, please visit UNICEF’s Entitlements’ page. If you would like to find estimates for entitlements, you may use the online Salary Estimate Calculator