Emergency and Community Health Outreach (ECHO)

ECHO uses numerous mechanisms including television, phone, email, and a network of well-established community partners to share critical information in the native languages of community members. ECHO also offers suggestions on how to adapt its materials for other jurisdictions.

Namely,

• Each month, ECHO-TV produces a 20-minute television programme on a current health and safety issue in multiple languages. Topics range from influenza prevention to winter survival. Each episode includes a pre-recorded story, as well as a question and answer period in which ECHO hosts interview guest community leaders or topic experts who are fluent in the language in which the programme is being produced. All shows are also open-captioned in English to help viewers improve English-language skills. During a statewide emergency in Minnesota, ECHO TV broadcasts live on television station tpt (Twin Cities Public Television). The same emergency instructions reported in English on radio and television will be repeated in Hmong, Khmer, Lao, Somali, Spanish, and Vietnamese on ECHO TV.
• ECHO Phone is a system for the rapid dissemination of pre-recorded health and safety messages in non-English languages. Those who call a toll-free number (in the US: 1-888-883-8831) can receive health advice unless there are local or statewide emergencies which would have priority for this message dissemination system. Examples of this advice include how to keep from getting sick with vomiting and diarrhoea, or why you should avoid close contact with chickens, ducks, and other birds if traveling to Asia, Europe, or Africa. Health information is offered in 10 languages: Spanish, Hmong, Somali, Lao, Khmer, Vietnamese, Russian, Arabic, Oromo, and English. In a major local or statewide emergency, ECHO Phone will provide emergency information in all 10 languages.
• In non-emergency times, ECHO Email sends health and safety messages to its community partners - leaders and advocacy organisations in the communities ECHO serves - who have agreed to share ECHO information with people in their communities. In an emergency, ECHO Email sends emergency bulletins and updates them as the situation changes.
• At any time, people may access health-related information and resources on the ECHO website, which is offered in English, Hmong, Khmer, Lao, Somali, Spanish, and Vietnamese.

For example, during the initial wave of 2009 H1N1 influenza in the spring of 2009, ECHO reportedly responded quickly when asked to produce a package of broadcast announcements and ECHO Phone messages about the illness. In the autumn of that year, under contract with the Minnesota Department of Health, ECHO produced 2 additional packages of broadcast announcements and phone messages in 12 different languages, as well as an ECHO-TV programme dealing specifically with H1N1. A third package of broadcast and phone messages will deal specifically with vaccination issues. Also, ECHO's H1N1 page includes basic prevention information, vaccine prioritisation information and other prevention tips. Video, audio, and printable public service announcements (PSAs) are available in Amharic, Arabic, English, Hmong, Karen, Khmer (Cambodian), Laotian, Oromo, Russian, Somali, Spanish and Vietnamese.

Health, Emergency, Literacy.

Minnesota organisations charged with public health and emergency preparedness created ECHO in 2004. They saw that new systems were needed to help all Minnesotans stay safe and healthy as hundreds of thousands of immigrants and refugees from vastly different cultures and climates made this state home.

In 2009, ECHO saw a marked increase in calls to ECHO Phone and visits to the ECHO website during the March floods in northwestern Minnesota, as well as the initial wave of H1N1 in April and May.