People-focused approach at centre of tackling COVID-19 in Dubai

Sajila Saseendran | Senior Reporter

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a unique challenge for the entire world. But, it was probably the first time that Dubai had to deal with a health crisis.

Yet, the emirate was able to manage it in an exceptional and distinguished manner. Whether it was the initial stage of imposing a stay home policy and an emirate-wide disinfection drive or the early and gradual reopening with ample boost for the economy, Dubai always made sure to come up with the right strategies to ensure the highest level of safety for members of the community and support for the business sector.

How did Dubai formulate the policies that helped bring the pandemic under control while considering all the dimensions of the health, social and economic aspects of the community? Gulf News posed this question to Aisha Miran, Assistant Secretary General for Strategy Management and Governance at the Executive Council of Dubai.

The Executive Council (TEC) is a centre of government entities that is responsible for overseeing the government’s collaboration, coordination and strategy implementation.

The first steps

When the unprecedented health crisis hit, Aisha said TEC was at the forefront to mobilise a full team to tackle the pandemic.

“One of the first things that we did was to establish a COVID-19 Command and Control Centre,” she said in an exclusive interview.

The Command and Control Centre was set up under the directive of Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Executive Council.

“It was reporting to a committee [the Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management in Dubai] that was also formed for crisis management for Dubai.”

The Supreme Committee headed by Sheikh Mansoor bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum coordinates with the federal entities.

“The role we [under TEC] played in that is that we ensured the setup of the Command and Control Centre with different streams, right structure in place, bringing in relevant parties from the public and private sectors. We also took the lead in doing the project management work throughout the formation and implementation of the decisions and the strategies, moving forward. We also played a big role in the public policy front, leveraging our expertise in managing the Command and Control Centre,” explained Aisha.

Early reopening strategy

In the earlier stages of the Command and Control Centre, Aisha said her team worked to put the strategy and action plan together.

“We looked at best practices and benchmarks. We looked at how countries and cities started reacting to the pandemic because, by its nature, it was new and unique. In Dubai, we were lucky enough to bring in private and public sectors and also the subject matter experts, who helped us shape that strategy, locally.”

Aisha revealed that the strategies were customised, based on four stages.

“The first stage was slowing the spread of the virus and therefore you would have noticed that in the early stages of the crisis, we had very strict control measures and there was a time when we had to impose restrictions and the intention behind that was to control the spread of the virus as well as to boost our healthcare capacity to be ready, God forbid, for a worst-case scenario.”

The second stage was a gradual reopening. “We started reopening from last year itself. We were among a few cities in the world to reopen our economy and have a gradual life back and follow the new normal early on.”

“The third stage was part of safeguarding and protecting the social life and economic life while lifting the restrictions and ensuring that our health objectives are being met and eventually lead to the fourth stage, which is full recovery or building our readiness for the coming era which is the new normal.”

Aisha said the whole philosophy and strategy revolved around striking a balance between the economic and social objectives, without forgetting the health and safety of the people.

Predicting future course

Dubai entities also developed a new epidemiological model to predict COVID-19 spread.

Smart Dubai and Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences (MBRU) developed the new COVID-19 epidemiological model to predict the future course of the pandemic more accurately.

Researchers at the entities developed and tested a specialised version of the Susceptible-Exposed-Infected-Removed (SEIR) model, which is better able to capture the unique dynamics of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The extended version of the SEIR, which mathematically models the spread of infectious diseases with incubation periods, was used by the COVID-19 Command and Control Centre to make timely measures at tackling the impact of the novel coronavirus by incorporating it in the dashboard.

The customised model called SEAHIR (Susceptible-Exposed-Asymptomatic-Hospitalised-Isolated-Removed) can forecast healthcare requirements through a detailed framework. It also takes into consideration the impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions, such as physical distancing, and different testing strategies on the number of confirmed cases.

The SEAHIR model enabled the Command and Control Centre to make timely measures on developing testing strategies, increasing healthcare capacity, and implementing interventions to contain the spread of the virus.

People-focused matrix

“People’s life was an essential part of whatever we have done. Therefore, we had put a matrix in place. That matrix was assessing the different sectors’ risk factors—what is the risk of exposure, what will be the likelihood of the spread of the virus in case we relax certain sectors or certain measures etc.”

That called for a thorough assessment of the situation on the ground. “Therefore, we had to do an assessment. We looked at different criteria, one of which is the detection rate—where do we stand today in terms of cases in the city and the spread of the virus. We also looked at our healthcare capacity and the utilisation rates. With the reopening, we were expecting a few increases in cases here and there, but still, it was all under control.”

A consultative, collaborative approach

Dubai’s strategies have always tried to strike a balance between the social life and economic life of the people. Aisha attributes it to the government’s “consultative and collaborative approach in everything it does.”

“Because it was new and because the Dubai government always takes a consultative and collaborative approach in everything it does, we consulted our stakeholders.”

She was quick to clarify that stakeholders do not mean the government agencies only.

“We had various entities across the government. We also consulted the private sector, NGOs, not-for-profit organisations and even individuals because we wanted to hear them out…because it was important for us to understand the sufferings that they are going through.”

Hearing out businesses, individuals

Aisha said that when Dubai opened up the malls and retail sector, extensive meetings were conducted with the retail groups and malls.

“We wanted to ensure that what we were setting up was realistic and not cumbersome. We also wanted to have the right compliance rate in place and make sure that the compliance should not come at the expense of others. That was important for us to balance and to hear out.”

For that very reason, the government always updated and amended the protocols as the situation progressed.

How peoples’ pleas were heard

Aisha recollected the government changing a policy after hearing the plea of a mother on social media.

The woman was in tears when she sought permission for her child with a disability to walk around during the lockdown.

“We realised it was quite important for their mental wellbeing. We looked at it and we spoke to local health experts who brought in their international and local experience and advised us. Accordingly, there was a decision issued for people with disabilities to seek a permit and walk around if it was a necessity.”

As things progressed, and until now, the government has been in direct consultation with the relevant stakeholders, Aisha pointed out.

When masks were to be worn throughout the day, the government looked at revising the mask protocol after getting requests from people who had health issues while wearing masks.

“We looked at the requests that we were getting, hearing out the people and we were looking at the World Health Organisation and the US Centres for Disease Control and we had our protocol for exemption for masks with permission. We formed protocols for when people are allowed to remove their masks. We did allow mask exemption while performing physical activities also.” A system was formed wherein those seeking exemption from wearing a mask could seek special approval from the Dubai Health Authority.

Striking a balance

Aisha also revealed how Dubai ensured to have strategies that strike a balance among various aspects of the society while dealing with the pandemic.

“It was all based on our strategy and objective of striking a balance between our healthcare system objectives and ensuring that our healthcare system can cater to any case, and ensuring that the businesses are not bleeding and can sustain themselves as well as ensure people’s mental health and their well-being. These are the important objectives that we tried to maintain throughout the management of this pandemic,” she said.

For this, she said: “We were always seeking feedback from our stakeholders, be it official letters, meetings that we conduct with them, the feedback from the focus groups and others. We also had a team constantly looking at the international best practices.”

However, one was not in a position to say that there were international best practices out there because the entire world was learning lessons from the pandemic for the first time. “Everyone was trying something and learning from it. So it was a trial and error for all. The best way was to analyse the things that you do and if it doesn’t fit [your objectives], you adapt and so forth.”

Aisha said Dubai’s approach in this aspect has always been “agile, adaptive and flexible.” “We see what others have done, we see our own needs and on the relaxation of protocols, three important measures were always looked at.”

These included the readiness of the healthcare system, economic growth and the public’s wellbeing.

“It was quite important that people were aware of the protocols and people comply with those protocols. Therefore, inspections were set by relevant agencies to ensure that people complied. Every time we had new protocols, we also had compliance reports.”

Relaxing and reopening

When things were progressing well and the number of cases were falling, Aisha said Dubai started “relaxing the restrictions more and more”.

“This is an evolving situation. So, today we are reviewing the protocols of all the sectors in Dubai again, towards our recovery and back to the normal plan that we have set for Dubai. It has been a year and a half, and we need to learn how to live with the virus, moving forward and that is our new philosophy—living with it and trying to cope with it with right measures in place.”

An eye-opener

From her personal experience, Aisha said it has been “an eye-opener on how much a city can do with its people.”

“It was a great example, a great testimonial by the people and by businesses and we hear everyone coming from abroad say how the country and Dubai were able to manage the pandemic. It was, may be, the first time that we as a city and country had to deal with a health crisis, but we were able to manage it in an exceptional and distinguished manner that we have others as well talking about it,” she said with pride.

Aisha attributes this success to the close collaboration between the local and federal governments and the visionary leadership.

“We have a visionary leadership that is very close to its people and its businesses, that understands what is right and takes the right decisions at the right time.”

“We didn’t hesitate to open our airport…we didn’t hesitate to open our businesses. And that did not backfire. Today, we are not as we used to be, but we are seeing everything alive in Dubai. You can go around, you can do whatever you want while following restrictions, maintaining social distancing, wearing masks and being careful in crowded places. You need to always maintain that.”

Having been an integral part of the emirate’s success story during the COVID-19 pandemic, Aisha is proud to be an Emirati citizen.

“I am very proud to be a citizen of this country. I thank our leadership for everything that they have done, I thank our frontliners, I thank all the government agencies, I thank our people, for their patience and understanding and for complying with the rules and regulations. In shah Allah, with everyone’s efforts, we will be able to move on and remember this crisis one day…as we say, it is a story that we can tell our grandchildren.”