MERIT Objectives

The Meningitis Environmental Risk Information Technologies (MERIT) project is a joint effort of the World Health Organization (WHO) and collaborators to utilize more effectively existing knowledge of the epidemiology of meningoccal meningitis to

1. Improve current control strategies;
2. Improve the understanding of the relationship between bacterial meningitis and environmental parameters;
3. Use this understanding to provide more timely warnings of the onset of meningitis epidemics; and
4. Use this knowledge to improve the efficacy of meningitis prevention and control strategies.

MERIT organization

MERIT is managed by an institutional steering committee chaired by the WHO. The actions of the steering committee are defined by its Terms of Reference, which may be amended at any time by the steering committee. Steering committee meetings are open.

MERIT highlights

The second MERIT Science Meeting took place in December 2008 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The meeting focused on the development of decision support tools to prediction meningitis epidemics.

There was a one-day capacity building workshop immediately following the MERIT meeting, which focused on:

1. The MERIT team sharing with the Ethiopian meningitis and climate community the outcomes of the two-day MERIT meeting and sharing the broad knowledge of international experts attending the MERIT meeting

2. Enabling the MERIT team to learn from the Ethiopian community with regard to national needs, current activities and plans for the future in terms of meningitis prevention and control and engagement with the climate community

An outcome of this meeting was the creation of MERIT-Ethiopia. Led by the Federal Ministry of Health through the Ethiopian Climate and Health Working Group, they will focus on an intensive research project:

1. to understand the social and economic impacts of meningococcal meningitis on Ethiopian society; and

2. to develop more effective tools to prvide early warnings and a more effective response to this deadly disease