10 September 2025
Issued on: 10 September 2025
Deadline: 10 October 2025
The WHO Regional Office for Africa (WHO-AFRO) is seeking experts to serve as members one of the Technical Advisory Group on Noncommunicable Diseases in the WHO African Region. This “Call for experts” provides information about the advisory group in question, the expert profiles being sought, the process to express interest, and the process of selection.
Background
The burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancer, and chronic respiratory diseases, in the WHO African Region has been increasing over the past two decades, due to the epidemiological transition from an ageing population combined with unhealthy lifestyles (such as tobacco use, harmful use of alcohol, unhealthy diet, and physical inactivity). Other NCDs include those related to mental disorders, oral diseases, ear and eye health conditions, violence, and injuries. Major NCDs caused about 21.0% of all deaths in 2000 and increased to 35.4% of all deaths in 2021. NCDs are set to overtake communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases combined as the leading cause of mortality in sub-Saharan Africa by 2030. Beyond mortality, NCDs are the largest cause of productivity losses in the African Region, and all-age total disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) due to NCDs increased by 62.3% from 1990 (95.6 million) to 2021 (178.4 million).
In its role, WHO-AFRO, through its normative and technical work, has supported regional efforts towards ending these diseases. This work has been guided by the needs of Member States as well as by emerging and evolving evidence and supported by experts. In this respect, WHO-AFRO will establish the Technical Advisory Group on NCDs in the WHO African Region (hereafter AG), whose members will serve in a personal capacity, representing a range of disciplines relevant to WHO-AFRO’s work towards ending NCDs such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, chronic respiratory diseases, sickle diseases, oral diseases, eye and ear health condition, and risk factors and violence injury.
The mission of this AG is to contribute to ending NCDs by providing strategic and technical advice to support evidence-based programming, policy development, and implementation of effective interventions across the African Region.
Functions of the Technical Advisory Group on Noncommunicable Diseases in the WHO African Region
In its capacity as an advisory body to WHO-AFRO, the AG shall have the following functions:
- To provide WHO-AFRO with independent technical and strategic advice on progress towards reaching the targets and milestones of the NCDs global and regional strategies;
- To review and make recommendations to WHO-AFRO for overcoming any challenges to achieving the above targets and milestones;
- To advise WHO-AFRO on the development of regional strategic documents;
- To advise WHO-AFRO on strengthening partnerships between WHO-AFRO, Member States, civil society organizations, academic institutions, and development partners to drive progress on NCD-related goals; and
- To propose other strategic interventions and activities for implementation by WHO-AFRO.
Operations of the Technical Advisory Group on Noncommunicable Diseases in the WHO African Region
The AG shall normally meet twice each year. However, WHO-AFRO may convene additional meetings. AG meetings may be held in person (at WHO-AFRO in Brazzaville, Congo, or another location, as determined by WHO-AFRO) or virtually, via video or teleconference.
AG meetings may be held in open and/or closed session, as decided by the Chairperson in consultation with WHO-AFRO.
Who can express interest?
The Technical Advisory Group on Noncommunicable Diseases in the WHO African Region will be multidisciplinary, with members who have a range of technical knowledge, skills, and experience relevant to 1) NCDs case management, 2) NCD risk factors, 3) violence and injuries, 4) people with lived experience with NCDs. Approximately 25 members may be selected.
WHO welcomes expressions of interest from scientists, healthcare professionals, and healthcare regulators, people with lived experience with NCDs with expertise in the following areas:
- Specialists on case management, rehabilitation, and public health interventions for cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancer, chronic respiratory diseases, oral health, eye health, ear health, NCDs risk factors, violence, and injuries
- NCDs surveillance and research
- NCDs programmes’ implementation and evaluation
- NCDs policy, governance, and advocacy
- Health systems, including medicines, finance, service delivery, and workforce, to address NCDs
Submitting your expression of interest
To register your interest in being considered for the Technical Advisory Group on Noncommunicable Diseases in the WHO African Region, please submit the following documents by 10 October 2025, 24:00h (midnight) Brazzaville time (GMT+1) to afroncdtag@who.int using the subject line “Expression of interest for the Technical Advisory Group on Noncommunicable Diseases in the WHO African Region”:
- A cover letter, indicating your motivation to apply and how you satisfy the selection criteria. Please note that, if selected, membership will be in a personal capacity. Therefore, do not use the letterhead or other identification of your employer;
- Your curriculum vitae (including your nationality/ies) and
- A signed and completed Declaration of Interests (DOI) form for WHO Experts, available at https://www.who.int/about/ethics/declarations-of-interest.
After submission, your expression of interest will be reviewed by WHO-AFRO. Due to an expected high volume of interest, only selected individuals will be informed.
Important information about the selection processes and conditions of appointment
Members of WHO-AFRO AGs must be free of any real, potential, or apparent conflicts of interest. To this end, applicants are required to complete the WHO Declaration of Interests for WHO Experts, and the selection as a member of a AG is, amongst other things, dependent on WHO-AFRO determining that there is no conflict of interest or that any identified conflicts could be appropriately managed (in addition to WHO-AFRO’s evaluation of an applicant’s experience, expertise and motivation and other criteria).
All AG members will serve in their individual expert capacity and shall not represent any governments, any commercial industries or entities, any research, academic or civil society organizations, or any other bodies, entities, institutions or organizations. They are expected to fully comply with the Code of Conduct for WHO Experts (https://www.who.int/about/ethics/declarations-of-interest). AG members will be expected to sign and return a completed confidentiality undertaking prior to the beginning of the first meeting.
At any point during the selection process, telephone interviews may be scheduled between an applicant and the WHO-AFRO Secretariat to enable WHO-AFRO to ask questions relating to the applicant’s experience and expertise and/or to assess whether the applicant meets the criteria for membership in the relevant AG.
The selection of members of the AGs will be made by WHO-AFRO in its sole discretion, taking into account the following (non-exclusive) criteria: relevant technical expertise; experience in international and country policy work; communication skills; and ability to work constructively with people from different cultural backgrounds and orientations. The selection of AG members will also take account of the need for diverse perspectives from different regions, especially from low and middle-income countries, and for gender balance.
If selected by WHO-AFRO, proposed members will be sent an invitation letter and a Memorandum of Agreement. Appointment as a member of the AG will be subject to the proposed member returning to WHO-AFRO the countersigned copy of these two documents.
WHO-AFRO reserves the right to accept or reject any expression of interest, to annul the open call process and reject all expressions of interest at any time without incurring any liability to the affected applicant or applicants and without any obligation to inform the affected applicant or applicants of the grounds for WHO-AFRO’s action. WHO-AFRO may also decide, at any time, not to proceed with the establishment of the AG, disband an existing TAG or modify the work of the AG.
WHO-AFRO shall not in any way be obliged to reveal, or discuss with any applicant, how an expression of interest was assessed, or to provide any other information relating to the evaluation/selection process or to state the reasons for not choosing a member.
WHO-AFRO may publish the names and a short biography of the selected individuals on the WHO-AFRO internet.
AG members will not be remunerated for their services in relation to the AG or otherwise. Travel and accommodation expenses of AG members to participate in AG meetings will be covered by WHO-AFRO in accordance with its applicable policies, rules and procedures.
The appointment will be limited in time as indicated in the letter of appointment.
If you have any questions about this “Call for experts”, please write to afroncdtag@who.int well before the applicable deadline.