implementation guidance to strengthen emergency National HealthSimulation Exercise implementation guidance to strengthen emergency National Health Simulation Exercise Programme: implementation guidance to strengthen emer- ISBN 978-92-4-011920-8 (electronic version)ISBN 978-92-4-011921-5 (print version) © World Health Organization 2025 Some rights reserved. This work is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCom-mercial-ShareAlike 3.0 IGO licence (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO;https://creativecommons.org/li- Under the terms of this licence, you may copy, redistribute and adapt the work for non-commer-cial purposes, provided the work is appropriately cited, as indicated below. In any use of this work,there should be no suggestion that WHO endorses any specific organization, products or services.The use of the WHO logo is not permitted. If you adapt the work, then you must license your workunder the same or equivalent Creative Commons licence. If you create a translation of this work,you should add the following disclaimer along with the suggested citation:“This translation was Any mediation relating to disputes arising under the licence shall be conducted in accordance withthe mediation rules of the World Intellectual Property Organization Suggested citation. National Health Simulation Exercise Programme: implementation guidance tostrengthen emergency preparedness, readiness and response. Geneva: World Health Organiza- Cataloguing-in-Publication (CIP) data.CIP data are available athttps://iris.who.int/. Sales, rights and licensing.To purchase WHO publications, seehttps://www.who.int/publica-tions/book-orders. To submit requests for commercial use and queries on rights and licensing, seehttps://www.who.int/copyright. Third-party materials.If you wish to reuse material from this work that is attributed to a thirdparty, such as tables, figures or images, it is your responsibility to determine whether permission isneeded for that reuse and to obtain permission from the copyright holder. The risk of claims re- General disclaimers.The designations employed and the presentation of the material in this publi-cation do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of WHO concerning thelegal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimita- The mention of specific companies or of certain manufacturers’ products does not imply that theyare endorsed or recommended by WHO in preference to others of a similar nature that are not mentioned. Errors and omissions excepted, the names of proprietary products are distinguished All reasonable precautions have been taken by WHO to verify the information contained in thispublication. However, the published material is being distributed without warranty of any kind,either expressed or implied. The responsibility for the interpretation and use of the material lies Contents Acknowledgements......................................................................................................................................................... iiiGlossary......................................................................................................................................................................... ivList of tables........................................................................................................................................................................ viList of abbreviations....................................................................................................................................................... viiChapter I: Background ............................................................................................................................................. 11.1.Introduction..............................................................................................................................................................11.2.Who should use this guidance? ...........................................................................................................................21.3.Why should countries conduct SimEx? ............................................................................................................31.4.Why should countries have an NHSEP? ...........................................................................................................31.5.Potential benefits of an NHSEP ..........................................................................................................................41.6.Risk-informed approach to SimEx .....................................................................................................................4 Chapter II: Framework and Structural Elements of the NHSEP ................................................................ 7 2.1.NHSEP design, implementation and evaluation steps...............................................................