READY 2 playtesting volunteers wanted

The READY Initiative is looking for a few experienced serious gamers to join forthcoming user testing sessions and provide feedback on the design of its latest digital simulation (currently in development). In the simulation, you will assume the role of a health program manager in the fictional country of Thisland.

When major disease outbreaks occur, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are often on the frontlines, using their deep connections with affected communities and expertise to support outbreak readiness and response. READY, an initiative funded by USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance and led by Save the Children and a consortium of partners, is supporting NGOs to more effectively respond to major disease outbreaks in humanitarian settings. Through investments in a robust and diverse capacity-strengthening portfolio, knowledge and best-practice sharing, and engagement with key coordination groups to identify and respond to real-time needs, READY is equipping national and international humanitarian NGOs with knowledge and skills to be ready to respond to major disease outbreaks through integrated and community-centered approaches.

READY launched an earlier simulation, Outbreak READY!, in 2022. It is currently being used to train local health workers, humanitarian aid personnel, and others around the world.

If you are interested in participating, please sign up at this link. There are two types of user testing sessions:

• In a one-on-one session you will be asked to play the game as we watch (via Zoom), followed by discussion.
• In a focus group session you will be asked to play the game in advance, and then join a later group discussion (via Zoom).

I would recommend experienced gamers volunteer for the latter (focus group) role. Please sign up by February 24, if interested.

If you are interested but are not able to join us for this round, let us know so we can engage you in the next round user testing sessions in May 2023. 

MORS: Gaming emergency response to disease course

The Military Operations Research Society will be offering a three day online course on “gaming emergency response to disease” on 27-29 September 2022, featuring Roger Mason, Ed McGrady, and Pete Pellegrino.

In this three-day course we will focus on the application of professional games to the problems associated with disease response and will cover pandemic response games, both national and international. The objective throughout the course will be to identify unique or challenging aspects involved in designing games involving disease response.

Day 1:

• ​Introduction: The Problem of Disease Response
• Game Design Fundamentals
• Ways to Apply Games to Disease Response
• Basic Biology and Epidemiology in Games

Day 2:

• ​Strategic, Operational, and Tactical Game Examples
• PANDEMIC TEMPEST
• Exercise: Nature or Nurture
• Matrix Games
• Exercise: Building a Disease Response Game

Day 3:

• ​Emergency Response Process
• Disease and Emergency Response
• Emergency Response Games
• Exercise: Building Emergency Response Games
• Exercise: Practicum and Discussion

More information and registration at the link above.

Outbreak READY! infectious disease simulation

The READY Initiative was established in 2018 by Save the Children, the Johns Hopkins Center for Humanitarian Health, the Johns Hopkins Center for Communications Programs, UK-Med, EcoHealth Alliance and Mercy Malaysia to strengthen global capacity to respond to major disease outbreaks. To the end it has developed a variety of training and outreach programmes, operational readiness checklists, and other tools for use by humanitarian and development NGOs and others. Funding is provided by USAID.

Much of this training initially took place in-person—something that became more difficult when the global COVID-19 pandemic hit. To facilitate remote training, it was decided to develop an online simulation: Outbreak READY!

Outbreak READY! is a digital simulation strengthening the readiness of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to respond to large-scale infectious disease outbreaks in humanitarian contexts. Through a unique, digital interpretation of an outbreak simulation, READY brings the complex nature of a humanitarian outbreak response to life utilizing a computer-based serious game that allows participants to test and refine their readiness skills and knowledge.

In Outbreak READY!, you will take the role of an NGO team lead managing a multi-sectoral humanitarian program portfolio for a medium-sized, international NGO named READY. The response takes place in a fictitious, low-income country that recently experienced civil conflict following a disputed national election. The simulation is divided into two modules: the first focuses on readiness prioritizations and actions as an outbreak is identified in a neighboring country; the second focuses on the NGO’s response to the outbreak as it begins to spread. Over the course of the simulation, the learner must make decisions that determine how the NGO adapts and expands programs to respond to the outbreak.

The simulation is designed for national and international NGOs responding to humanitarian emergencies, particularly targeting NGO leaders and managers from both operational and programmatic backgrounds across all sectors.

This simulation is set in “Thisland,” a low-income developing country that recently suffered from a period of violent conflict. Government capacity is limited outside the capital and corruption remains a serious problem. The country’s public health infrastructure is weak. As noted above, the player assumes the role of the team lead for an international humanitarian relief and development non-governmental organization (READY) in the outlying city of Murelle. Your current programmes include health and nutrition, food security and livelihoods, cash and voucher assistance, and water, sanitation, and hygiene. Community engagement and protection are mainstreamed across your portfolio. In the course of the simulation you’ll interact with your country director, local staff, public health officials, a partner NGO, a journalist, and a community leader—among others

The narrative-choice simulation is designed for experienced humanitarian aid workers, not for neophytes. It is also more of a simulation than it is a game. There is a lot of information to juggle. Don’t expect to see immediate epidemiological consequences from your actions, since that’s not the way it works it the field—especially when you’re but one small part of a multi-stakeholder response. The simulation content was built with input from dozens of subject matter experts.

Nevertheless, I’ve used it with my own undergraduates, and the feedback has been very positive. I think it also has considerable value for “humanitarian adjacent” organizations and personnel who would like better insight into the perspective, concerns, and priorities of the humanitarian aid community. If you’re instructing military personnel, diplomats, or journalists about humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations, for example, I think they would learn a lot.

The simulation is browser-based for ease of access, designed for low-bandwidth environments, and intended to be robust across a broad range of browsers, platforms, and operating systems. It will be localized into French and Spanish too. &RANJ—the digital game company behind the peacebuilding game Mission Zhobia—was the development studio for the project.

From the very beginning, Outbreak READY was also designed with support for briefing, debriefing, and pedagogical support built into the project. The website thus includes an optional pre-reading package, a solo play guide, and very substantial (70+ page) facilitation guides for both virtual and in-person events. When players complete the simulation they also receive a substantial evaluation of their effectiveness as a humanitarian team leader during a major infectious disease outbreak.

I was fortunate to work on the project as part of the READY team (who, it must be said, were an absolutely terrific group to work with.) Click the link and give it a try!

WHO GOARN RFP: infectious disease outbreak response online game

The WHO Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN) has issued a request for proposals “to develop a serious online gaming prototype, targeting multidisciplinary public health emergency responders from around the world and utilising an outbreak response scenario, to build the large-scale multidisciplinary human response capacity with the cross-cutting knowledge, skills and behaviours needed to respond to COVID-19 and other infectious disease outbreaks.”

You will find the full details of the RFP here. The closing date for applications is 2 August 2021.