Dr Bassey Enya Bassey is a public health scientist with over 31 years of experience working in the Nigerian public health sector. His area of expertise cuts across, but not limited to fields of epidemiology, outbreak response, infectious disease control and policy management.

Haven spent over a decade working in World Health Organization’s Expanded program on Immunization (EPI) serving in various capacities from National Surveillance Officer to State Coordinator of WHO EPI projects in three significant states in Nigeria, Dr Bassey knows what truly drives the successful planning and implementation of EPI projects- and it is not how many professional accolades you show up with to an event. It is actually how well you connect with the heart-beating people you are trying to help and how well you communicate your understanding back to them.

As State Coordinator, he successfully coordinated the activities of hundreds of health and technical officers involved in the EPI, Integrated Disease Surveillance and Response (IDSR) and outbreak response. His ability to manage the operational planning and implementation of WHO incident management systems made him an asset to the Government of the Republic of Kenya and South Africa where he helped develop strategic plans for measles eradication, institutionalized the weekly reporting of measles cases thereby improving measles surveillance, conducted in-depth comprehensive EPI/Surveillance review to identify best practices, evaluate existing challenges and made recommendations that will guide EPI/Surveillance practices to improve performance.

Dr Bassey is a very committed and reliable team player. His ability to provide support for the regular identification and monitoring of health risks towards implementing the most effective preventive, control and response measures made him an excellent choice for the Ebola response team that provided outbreak response to the Government of Sierra Leone as well as in Nigeria during the 2014 Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak where he served as both Field Coordinator (Tonkolili district) and Team Coordinator Comprehensive EPI Review (Gauteng province) in South Africa respectively. As Field Coordinator, Dr Bassey coordinated the activities of all partner agencies involved in the outbreak response in Tonkolili District and other personnel drawn from the UK army, Ireland, India, Uganda and the USA.

As an excellent multitasker, he serves as the National President; Association of Medical Laboratory Scientists of Nigeria haven previously served the Association in various capacities ranging from Chairman, Association of Medical Laboratory Scientists of Nigeria to National Financial Secretary, Association of Medical Laboratory Scientists and then National Secretary, Association of Medical Laboratory Scientists of Nigeria. In these roles, he performed regular and frequent coordination of meetings to monitor and evaluate project implementation, facilitated resource mobilization, accountability of all stakeholders while providing the platform for capacity building for Association members.

In WHO Nigeria, he is among the lead facilitators in the developments of research protocols with over 50 publications in various well-read international peer reviewed journals. He has also supported the country in several occasions in the review of laboratory standards, plans, guidelines and other tools in the framework of IDSR and the International Health Regulation (IHR) of 2005.

An associate Professor in the University of Calabar, Nigeria with numerous involvements in community healthcare development projects, Dr Bassey Enya Bassey hold a Bachelor’s degree in Medical Laboratory Science with specialization in Medical Microbiology, MSc in Medical Microbiology and PhD in Environmental and Public Health Microbiology.  Certificate in Field Epidemiology & Laboratory and disease outbreak investigation (CDC/WHO) 2008, Certificate in Middle Level Management, Primary Health Care(WHO/NPHCDA)  2020 and Certificate in Management and Development(Managing Teams)(WHO) 2012, Certificate in Integrated Disease Surveillance & Response (WHO).

He has been actively involved in Nigeria’s Poliovirus containment activities. Dr Bassey was actively involved in Establishing schedule of visit to all laboratories in the states of assignment, Contact the  heads  of biomedical facilities and  laboratories to be visited prior to field visits, Conduct On-site visit to biomedical facilities and laboratories and administer questionnaires, Encourage and support destruction of poliovirus infectious or potentially infectious materials including tOPV, mOPV2, Sabin2 and VDPV2 through autoclaving and incineration, Document all infectious materials found and destroyed, Support in updating list of biomedical facilities in zone of assignment, Collate data, share with  WHO office, Forward weekly report of activities to the NTF coordinator and WHO and Present an end of assignment report by 20th October 2016. He has also been involved in biosafety and bio-risk management of infectious disease pathogens, infectious disease pathogens, laboratory and bio-medical safety, virology, molecular biology, immunology and epidemiology of infectious diseases, specifically in vaccine-preventable diseases, preferably in poliomyelitis. Dr Bassey was also involved in producing the draft and finalized country’s containment report.