Every year, hundreds of human lives are lost, people injured, property damaged and livelihoods disrupted due to hazards such as floods, landslides, cyclones, earthquakes and droughts which regularly occur in countries in the WHO South-East Asia Region (SEAR). Moreover, country health systems in the Region face challenging financial circumstances even during regular times to run basic operations. Therefore, the ability to mobilize resources swiftly in the aftermath of disasters and crises is critical in minimizing deaths and suffering. Nevertheless, much needed assistance often reaches ground zero of the disaster or emergency when the opportunity to save lives and reduce suffering has almost passed.

The Member States of SEA Region have come up with an innovative strategy to bridge the gap between emergency needs and the arrival of formal disaster relief funding within health systems, by launching the South-East Asia Regional Health Emergency Fund (SEARHEF).

SEARHEF was established during the Sixtieth Session of the WHO Regional Committee for South-East Asia, held in Thimphu, Bhutan in 2007. SEARHEF is expected to meet the immediate financial needs and fills critical gaps in an emergency. While complementing larger relief, long-term recovery, reconstruction, or rehabilitation work, SEARHEF has been a pioneer in the health emergency response in the Region.

In 2024, significant progress was made to strengthen the fund. At the Seventy-seventh Session of the WHO Regional Committee for South-East Asia, Member States adopted Resolution SEA/RC77/R2, approving major reforms to enhance SEARHEF’s effectiveness and requested revised business rules to operationalize these reforms. Building on these decisions, updated policies, and business rules under SEARHEF 2.0 were adopted in the Seventy-eighth Session of the WHO Regional Committee for South-East Asia, in October 2025.

SEARHEF 2.0 introduces new business rules effective from the 2026–27 biennium, increasing the fund’s corpus to USD 3 million, allowing unspent balances to roll over to future biennia, and merging the response and preparedness funding streams. For 2026–27, allocations will be guided by defined criteria, including declared health emergencies or disasters, government requests for external assistance, responses to PHEICs or pandemics, preparedness for imminent threats, implementation of key preparedness recommendations, and impending stock-outs of lifesaving supplies. Funding will be provided by Member States supplemented by cash or in-kind contributions from donors and partners.

For Emergency Response, WHO to contribute US $ 3 million per biennium supported by Member states, donors and partners beginning 1 January 2026. In addition, all 10 Member States have agreed to further bolster the SEARHEF corpus.

Member States of the Region can obtain SEARHEF funds within 24 hours under any one of the following conditions:
• Declaration of a state of health emergency/disaster at national or sub-national level;
• Official request for external assistance by the national government;
• Response to a Public Health Emergency of International Concern or Pandemic;
• Scale-up operational readiness for imminent threats (geo-climatic, or others) by Member State authorities and WHO;
• Initiate critical activities to strengthen preparedness based on recommendations including but not limited Joint External Evaluations, Simulation exercises or Intra/ After Action Reviews; or National Action Plan for Health Security;
• Documented impending stock-outs of emergency lifesaving medical supplies

SEARHEF disburses a maximum of US $ 400 000 for a given emergency, disbursed in two tranches: first up to US$200,000, second after 70% of the first is used. Fund validity period is six months from the time of disbursement for both response and Preparedness.

The requesting Member State is empowered to identify the best ways and means of spending the SEARHEF funding to suit the local needs of the emergency. SEARHEF has two streams of assistance:  

Response Stream

Member States could use the response stream to support emergency health relief activities such as:  

• I. Conducting rapid assessments
• II. Providing essential healthcare
• III. Supplying essential medicines
• IV. Augmenting emergency health staff
• V. Enhancing health staff mobility and safety
• VI. Addressing critical health facility repairs
• VII. Ensuring the access to safe water
• VIII. Preventing vector-borne diseases and other health hazards
• IX. Strengthening disease surveillance
• X. Boosting health education campaigns
• XI. Promoting the mental health of survivors

Preparedness Stream

Member states could use the preparedness stream to fund activities intended to enhance the resilience of health systems, such as:  

• I. Developing plans, guidelines, and standard operating procedures,
• II. Capacity building based on developed plans, guidelines, and standard operating procedures,
• III. Testing of plans.

SEARHEF has some unique features which make it ideal for serving its purpose. 

• • Speed of disbursement

SEARHEF disburses its funding within 24 hours of a request. 

• • A simple request, processing, approval, and reporting procedure

SEARHEF uses simple procedures at all stages of the emergency funding, considering the emergency nature of its disbursement while adhering to the usual accountability mechanisms. 

• • Flexibility to suit the local emergency specific needs

The requesting member state could design effective and innovative emergency interventions to suit the local needs. 

• • Having a response and preparedness streams

With the recently included preparedness stream, SEARHEF could contribute to the mitigation of disaster risks in addition to the emergency response.