Resolutely standing its post at Naval Station (NAVSTA) Rota, Spain, Navy Environmental Preventive Medicine Unit (NEPMU) 7 provides theatre-wide preventive medicine support to Navy and Marine Corps forces, joint and combined military operations, and allied governments when directed including supporting three combat commands (COCOMs). The team does this by providing a wide range of subject-matter expertise in areas including safety and occupational health, environmental health, integrated pest management, disease control and prevention, education and training, health promotion and wellness programs. As one of the only four NEPMUs in the Navy, NEPMU-7 commits itself to protect and preserve force health readiness through their capability to provide operational commanders with real-time or near-real-time risk information for decision-making.

In 2022, NEPMU-7 supported 57 commands/units in 18 countries across six geographic combatant commands! Ninety-one missions were accomplished to provide services such as ship sanitation control exemption certification inspection, food and water risk assessment, subject matter expert exchange for theater security cooperation, integrated pest management, vector-borne disease risk assessment, and theater working groups. To prepare our warfighters for missions, NEPMU-7 generated force health protection (FHP) briefs for 58 countries, as well as provided combat commanders with information and tools that help them to make critical decisions. Additionally, as a schoolhouse and training center, NEPMU 7 hosted eight catalog of Navy training courses (CANTRAC) and graduated over 30 preventive medicine technicians and other individuals working in sanitation, food handling, and disease vector control.

NEPMU 7 is stocked with subject matter experts: microbiologist, preventive medicine doctor, administration/business officer, environmental health officer, biochemist, industrial hygienist, entomologist, and preventive medicine technicians (PMT).

One of NEPMU 7’s corpsmen, PMT Chief Neilor Bicomong, is an example of how the command provides its expertise to assist and support the fleet. Selected to lead 30 joint service personnel and mentor three officers in the execution of FHP measures for the largest repositioning effort in East Africa, his superb leadership ensured the safe and rapid movement of 854 personnel and over 400 pieces of equipment, overcoming the challenges of COVID-19 restrictions.

Bicomong was selected as a Navy Chief for his superior leadership and outstanding performance, Bicomong led and mentored 19 enlisted and officers in daily operations as the ops chief. Planning and executing deployment of 19 members, he enabled successful completion of 68 missions to 19 countries, providing force health protection support to 90 operational units and 110,000 joint warfighters within three geographic COCOMs during and after the challenging COVID-19 pandemic. He was selected to support training of 20 Senegalese physicians, nurses, and medical technicians, assisting with development and implementation of PrevMed doctrine for the Senegalese military, a stabilizing regional force who is now a partner in health security. Additionally, he completed five SSCECs in support of 15 United States vessels, provided preventive medicine guidance to the ships’ public health concerns, and ensured that all each ship was able to moor in international ports for vital maintenance and replenishments.

NEPMU-7 is dedicated to “prepare” for potential public health emergencies, “protect” our forces from natural and manmade hazards, and “respond” to the hazards and emergencies. They proudly serve with the NAVSTA Rota community to achieve the goal of supporting the nation’s objectives and defense, providing unmatched preventive medicine support to the Navy, Marine Corps, the Joint Force, and allies and partners.