MLW conducted recruitment exercises from 27 October till 31 October 2021. The exercise was done to recruit new Community Liaison Team (CoLT) members in Chikwawa. The recruited CoLT members will be working closely with the Epidemiology Study of Malaria Transmission Intensity in Sub-Saharan Africa (EPIMAL) by MLW on a voluntary basis.
Cognizant of the role which local leaders play in societies; the Community Engagement team first knocked on the doors of various chiefs in Chikwawa to brief them about the COLT members’ selection process. The exercises took place at different locations including Mfera, Mapelera, Livunzu, and Mitondo health centres in Chikwawa.
According to the Community Engagement Coordinator at MLWElvis Moyo, the recruitment and training process is one of the components that is very key to a study such as EPIMAL.
“In the EPIMAL study, a census is followed by a Key Informant System (KIS). CoLT members help to collect data at the community level, the data relates to new births, deaths, and migration in respective Enumeration Areas (EAs). We cannot manage to capture this data without the help of the community members, and that is why we had to select new CoLT members especially in areas where some had moved out,” said Moyo.
The EPIMAL study is carried out to determine the effectiveness of the malaria vaccine in the Malawian context.
After successfully recruiting new CoLT members for EPIMAL study, MLW trained the new recruits to ground them in principles of data collection and health research.
Speaking after attending the training sessions, CoLT member Joseph Manjolo commended MLW for the well-delivered training which he said, would help him understand concepts that were almost impossible to understand without the trainings.
“As data enumerators, we are not the front-liners of research, but we are on the ground to make sure that we give the best to the front-liners of the research. With this training, we can guarantee quality data collection for EPIMAL study,” said Manjolo.
Among other duties, the new CoLT members are expected to be helping with data collection in their respective Enumeration Areas (EAs) and act as a bridge between MLW researchers and local communities.
Currently, MLW has over 250 CoLT members attached to EPIMAL study.
