Terms of Reference for Assessment of the Impact of COVID-19 hesitancy on Vaccination in Kenya, Christian Aid International

About Christian Aid

Christian Aid is an international development organization that has been working globally for over 70 years, in 37 countries, with people of all faiths and none, to stand up for dignity, equality and justice. Christian Aid has been working in Kenya since 1997 with over 30 partners across 20 counties, mainly in arid and semi-arid lands. Christian Aid builds and manages transformational partnerships with local civil society agencies, national and county governments, public authorities, the private sector, churches and religious organizations, who share common values to expose poverty, to help in practical ways to end it and to highlight and challenge the structures and systems that favor the rich and powerful over the poor and marginalized. Our work focuses on 4 thematic areas including: health and nutrition, climate change and energy, inclusive markets and humanitarian and resilience.

Background and Project Description

The COVID-19 pandemic harks back to yesteryears pitfalls in access to life saving medicines at the exclusion of the poorest and most vulnerable. Again, history is repeating itself, whereas the rest of the world continues to vaccinate its populations against the COVID-19 pandemic achieving impressive coverage, Africa and the developing world is lagging far behind. Of the 3.22 billion doses currently administered world-wide only 1% of people living in low-income countries have received a single dose^[1]. While the world has managed to develop multiple vaccines against the virus in record time and the production of vaccines is astronomical, rich nations have cornered the supply chain for the coming months, denying poor nations access to the lifesaving vaccines. Little to no attempt is being done to fix the broken model of vaccine and medicine development that relies on pharmaceutical corporations, despite tens of billions of public moneys being used to help develop vaccines. Big Pharma still retain the exclusive right to produce them and charge whatever price they see fit. National access to safe and effective vaccines against COVID-19 is being decided by a country’s financial and diplomatic clout rather than its actual health needs and expertise.

Christian Aid through the Vaccine Campaign seeks to contribute to increased supply, access, and uptake of safe, effective, and affordable COVID-19 vaccines by target population in Kenya. Through this project interventions, Kenyans will be able to have access to safe and effective vaccines delivered by key governments, multilateral bodies and corporations which enables people to return to their normal day-to-day lives including livelihood restoration, increased social interaction, economic growth, and health.

Objectives of the Consultancy

The objective of this consultancy is to collate and analyze available data on Covid-19 expenditure from the Office of the Auditor General/Controller of Budget as well as to better understand common objections to COVID-19 vaccination and the potential effects of misinformation on vaccine decisions.

Scope of the Consultancy and Methodology

The consultant is expected to work closely with Christian Aid Kenya, reporting to the Program Manager or their designate and will be tasked with:

• Developing an inception report, demonstrating an understanding of the study with a detailed field work plan on how he/she will carry out the activities to achieve the study objectives, adhering to the government guidelines and regulations especially considering COVID-19.
• The consultant will conduct desk review to provide background on key government expenditure on COVID-19, identify bottlenecks/barriers to access and uptake of the vaccination.
• Develop a comprehensive data research methodology to collect data from diverse sources at the national and county levels.
• Analyze the data and submit a draft report, using the gathered information from interviews. The draft report will be expected to provide preliminary answers to all the objectives, including analysis of policy implementations.
• Report on the findings of the analysis and provide recommendations

Deliverables

The key deliverable for the assignment are as below.

Estimated duration of Assignment

This consultancy is expected to start on March 14th, 2022, and end on April 8th, 2022.

Required Qualifications

The consultant/firm must possess the following qualifications:

• Minimum 7 years of relevant work experience in health policy advocacy and research, project management, evaluation, reporting and/or monitoring
• Possess knowledge and experience in budget analysis and tracking for evidence-based advocacy
• Demonstrated understanding of research methodologies and data management;
• Existing and diverse networks within the Kenya Health, transparency, public finance management or accountability sectors;
• Strong knowledge of the Kenya operating environment, especially as it relates to the health, transparency, public finance management or accountability;
• Ability to work effectively and communicate well in remote/online settings.
• Ability to work under minimal supervision and adapt to new program activity requirements and helping others to stay on track
• Knowledge designing research methodologies and tools for budget based data collection and analyses
• Similar work in the last 3 years (provide sample copy of recent reports). Familiarity with Christian Aid’s work is an added advantage.
• A demonstrated high level of professionalism and an ability to work independently

[1] https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations?