West Africa Disaster Preparedness Initiative (WADPI)

Non-invasive contact with Ebola survivors 6 weeks after the virus has been cleared poses little risk for healthcare workers, though contact with semen, ocular humor, and cerebrospinal fluid requires Ebola-appropriate precautions, according to a study yesterday in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

A cross-sectional cohort study evaluated 555 specimens from 112 Ebola survivors without fever seeking follow-up care at a clinic in Freetown, Sierra Leone, from Apr 2 to Jun 16, 2015. Almost one third of survivors (34, or 30%) were under the age of 16, and 50 (40%) were male.

Samples were obtained from the armpit (103 specimens), blood (93), conjunctiva (92), forehead (54), mouth (105), rectum (17), semen (1), urine (69), and vagina (21). The median time from Ebola treatment unit discharge to specimen collection was 142 days.

The deadly virus is passed on through contact with body fluids and killed more than 11,000 in ravaged western Africa and the US in 2014 and 2015.

The epidemic has now been declared over but researchers have monitored 450 survivors of both sexes for a year, testing tears, saliva, faeces, vaginal fluids and semen every three months thereafter.

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone, Monday 2 May, 2016// -- President Dr Ernest Bai Koroma has launched the National Employment Policy and Strategy and Implementation Plan for 2015-2018 at the Miatta Conference Hall, Brookfields in Freetown. The National Employment Policy is a policy response towards addressing and improving labor relations and conditions of service of workers in Sierra Leone.

During a grand ceremony to commemorate International Labour Day, the president said the launch of the new employment policy has clearly shown his government’s commitment and effectiveness in addressing labour issues in the country. He stated that government is part of labour congress and that is why programmes and policies under his administration are always directed towards the protection of the ordinary man, adding that government has come reasonably far to formalizing the informal sector.