Africa Resilience Initiative

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Sat, 2009-03-21 11:57 — mdmcdonald

The mission of this working group is to articulate and shape issues of resilience and sustainability on the continent of Africa as they may be implemented as reforms of current policies, as well as contemplate and make recommendations for more extensive critiques and proposals for national, provincial, and local systems transformation, as may be necessary or desirable beyond the scope of traditional reforms being undertaken by the current African national governments and local government proposals in Africa.

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This working group is focused on developing an Africa Resilience Initiative to ensure resilience and sustainability for all Africans.

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Aboubacar Conte	admin	Anthony	bnorton	Carrielaj	Chisina Kapungu
ChrisAllen	craig.sevcik	Dr Ojia Adamolekun	efrost	Elhadj Drame	Grace Kim
Hadiatou Balde	jranck	Kathy Gilbeaux	mdmcdonald	MDMcDonald_me_com	mike kraft
njchapman	Norea	SmShako	TacarraB	Tjivekumba Kandjii

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Health Authorities Repeating Mistakes in Ebola Fight: MSF

Sun, 2015-06-14 21:35 — Kathy Gilbeaux

A Sierra Leonean doctor practises wearing protective clothing in the Ebola Training Academy in Freetown, Sierra Leone, December 16, 2014. Reuters/Baz Ratner

AFP - June 13, 2015

Dakar (AFP) - Health authorities are repeating the mistakes of the past in combatting Ebola, more than a year after its onset in Guinea and Sierra Leone, the international president of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) warned.

Joanne Liu's remarks on Saturday come a day after Sierra Leone imposed a three-week daytime curfew in the last Ebola-hit areas in a bid to curb a resurgence of the deadly virus, which has killed about 3,900 people in the country.

Neighbouring Liberia was declared Ebola-free in May, but hopes that Sierra Leone and Guinea would quickly follow suit have been dashed in recent weeks.

"We are still making the same mistakes as we did in the past," said Liu.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

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Home > Health Sierra Leone Leader Imposes Curfew in Bid to Halt Ebola

Fri, 2015-06-12 16:19 — mike kraft

ASSOCIATED PRESS By CLARENCE ROY-MACAULAY June 12, 2015

FREETOWN -- Sierra Leone's president imposed new restrictions Friday preventing people from entering or leaving two chiefdoms in the northern part of the country that are experiencing a resurgence of Ebola.

While neighboring Liberia has defeated Ebola, Sierra Leone and Guinea have continued to battle new cases, particularly along the border where those two countries meet.

Sierra Leone had 15 news cases in the week ending June 7, according to the World Health Organization, the highest weekly total since late March.

On Friday, President Ernest Bai Koroma said people would be barred from entering or leaving the affected parts of Kambia and Port Loko districts in northern Sierra Leone. A 21-day curfew also will be in effect from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., government officials said, though the public health benefit of such a limited measure was not immediately clear.

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International Ebola Recovery Conference Ending Ebola: “Get to Zero, Stay at Zero and Rebuild”

Thu, 2015-06-11 21:50 — Maeryn Obley

Congo Town, Freetown, Sierra Leone. Photo: Dylan Lowthian/UNDP

Image: Congo Town, Freetown, Sierra Leone. Photo: Dylan Lowthian/UNDP

africa.undp.org - May 9th, 2015

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will host an International Ebola Recovery Conference in July to ensure that the affected countries receive the resources and support they need to overcome the wider socio-economic consequences of the ongoing Ebola outbreak.

The conference at United Nations Headquarters in New York on 10 July 2015 will take place in cooperation with the Governments of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, together with other partners.

With numbers of Ebola cases have dropped, the affected countries still need the support of the international community to get to zero cases, stay there, and to move forward on the road to recovery.

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How Computer Modelers Took On the Ebola Outbreak

Wed, 2015-06-10 09:35 — Kathy Gilbeaux

submitted by Sarah Slaughter

At The Epidemic’s Epicenter: A Liberian child sits in an Ebola isolation ward housing people who might have contracted the contagious disease. Photo: John Moore/Getty Images

Did real-time epidemic modeling save lives in West Africa?

spectrum.ieee.org - by David Brown - May 28, 2015

. . . “agent-based” models will give a more nuanced picture of how pathogens affect and sicken a population. “This is the wave of the future,” says Stephen Eubank, deputy director of the Virginia Tech lab. “It’s going to take a concerted effort to gather the data and the expertise. But it’s going to happen.”

And so, too, will another Ebola outbreak.

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Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak in Nigeria: Transmission Dynamics and Rapid Control

Sat, 2015-06-06 23:41 — Kathy Gilbeaux

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov - Epidemics. 2015 Jun;11:80-4. doi: 10.1016/j.epidem.2015.03.001. Epub 2015 Mar 21

Abstract

International air travel has already spread Ebola virus disease (EVD) to major cities as part of the unprecedented epidemic that started in Guinea in December 2013. An infected airline passenger arrived in Nigeria on July 20, 2014 and caused an outbreak in Lagos and then Port Harcourt. After a total of 20 reported cases, including 8 deaths, Nigeria was declared EVD free on October 20, 2014. We quantified the impact of early control measures in preventing further spread of EVD in Nigeria and calculated the risk that a single undetected case will cause a new outbreak. We fitted an EVD transmission model to data from the outbreak in Nigeria and estimated the reproduction number of the index case at 9.0 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 5.2-15.6). We also found that the net reproduction number fell below unity 15 days (95% CI: 11-21 days) after the arrival of the index case. Hence, our study illustrates the time window for successful containment of EVD outbreaks caused by infected air travelers.

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Managing the Risk and Impact of Future Epidemics: Options for Public-Private Cooperation

Sat, 2015-06-06 23:01 — Kathy Gilbeaux

submitted by Denis Gilhooly

World Economic Forum
Prepared in collaboration with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG)

CLICK HERE - Managing the Risk and Impact of Future Epidemics: Options for Public-Private Cooperation

CLICK HERE - REPORT - Managing the Risk and Impact of Future Epidemics: Options for Public-Private Cooperation
(20 page .PDF report)

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa was a public health emergency of new proportions that presented unprecedented challenges for the international community. Aside from the significant social and economic impact it had on many West African countries, the epidemic also triggered a range of innovative, flexible partnership responses from businesses and civil society that complemented the channels of official assistance to affected countries.

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The contribution of Ebola viral load at admission and other patient characteristics to mortality in a Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) Ebola Case Management Centre (CMC), Kailahun, Sierra Leone, June –October, 2014

Sat, 2015-06-06 21:48 — Kathy Gilbeaux

m.jid.oxfordjournals.org - J Infect Dis. (2015) doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiv304 First published online: May 22, 2015

Abstract

This paper describes patient characteristics, including Ebola viral load, associated with mortality in an MSF Ebola case management centre.

Out of 780 admissions between June and October 2014, 525 (67%) were positive for Ebola with a known outcome. The crude mortality rate was 51% (270/525). Ebola viral load (whole blood sample) data was available on 76% (397/525) of patients. Univariate analysis indicated viral load at admission, age, symptom duration prior to admission and distance travelled to the CMC were associated with mortality (p value<0.05). The multivariable model predicted mortality in those with a viral load at admission greater than 10 million copies per millilitre (p value<0.05, Odds Ratio>10), aged 50 years or more (p value=0.08, Odds Ratio=2) and symptom duration prior to admission less than 5 days (p value=0.14). The presence of confusion, diarrhoea and conjunctivitis were significantly higher (p value<0.05) in Ebola patients who died.

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New Thinking on Countering Outbreaks

Tue, 2015-06-02 20:37 — Kathy Gilbeaux

If Ebola has taught us anything, it is that there is room for innovation in the way we respond to outbreaks.

medium.com - by Paul G. Allen - April 30, 2015

It has been more than a year since we began tackling this latest epidemic and, while significant progress has been made, there are still challenges to be overcome and gaps to be filled. . . .

. . . Just last week, I partnered with Skoll Global Threats Fund and USAID to host the Ebola Innovation Summit — an interactive event, designed to bring new tools, people, ways of thinking and ultimately innovations to the forefront.

The event drew a diverse group of people from around the world — from the tech and private sectors to nonprofits, government and academia. The collective commitment of this group is a great example for how we should collaborate to tackle global problems like Ebola.

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Did Authorities Use the Wrong Approach to Stop Ebola?

Mon, 2015-06-01 11:03 — mike kraft

A new study suggests there was a better way to respond to the Ebola outbreak

TIME MAGAZINE by Alexandra Sifferlin May 26, 2015

It’s known that the response to the most recent Ebola outbreak, which as of Tuesday had infected more than 27,000 people and killed 11,130, was far too slow. Now, a new studysuggests that even once they got started, their approach to curbing the spread wasn’t the most efficient or effective.Read complete story.

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The Swift Unraveling of Fragile Peace in Burundi

Sat, 2015-05-30 21:18 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Refugees from Burundi arrive at the Mahama camp in Rwanda. The political crisis in Burundi has driven thousands to seek refuge in neighboring countries. Photo by: Thomas Conan / ECHO / CC BY-ND

devex.com - by Andrew Green - May 25, 2015

A failed coup and ongoing political conflict in Burundi have sparked a regional refugee crisis and stalled much-needed development projects in one of the world’s poorest countries.

This after Burundi spent the past decade attempting to overcome a post-independence period marred by a brutal civil war played out largely along ethnic lines. . . .

. . . The 10 years of relative peace allowed humanitarian partners to transition from emergency relief to long-term development projects in a country consistently ranked among the five poorest in the world. Now many of those partners have evacuated, as the country’s political situation has unraveled over the past month.

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