Sierra Leone’s president on Thursday assailed the global community’s slow response to Ebola as United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon called for a “20-fold” increase in resources to battle the epidemic. From AFP:
President Ernest Bai Koroma told Ban and the heads of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank that the global reaction “has been slower than the rhythm of transmission of the disease.”
“This slower-than-the-virus response needs to change,” he said via video conference from his country, one of the three in West Africa severely hit by Ebola, which has so far killed nearly 3,900 people.
“Because of the time delay, it is going to cost us a lot more…. What is required is required yesterday,” he said.
Koroma, Guinea President Alpha Conde and Liberia President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf pressed the group for a more rapid rollout of support to fight the spread of Ebola.
Conde said his country needed the rapid establishment of treatment centers with 1,500 more beds and 5,000 health care workers.
Sirleaf also stressed the need to ramp up support within weeks to prevent the disease from devastating the region’s economy.
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Spotlight on PSI
Blogger Jennifer James reflects on meeting a lifelong family planning health worker, while traveling with PSI in Tanzania. An excerpt from the Impact blog:
Blandina Mpacha first learned about being a family planning health worker on the only radio station in Tanzania at the time. Back then, she recalled between sips of coffee, only women who worked in offices used family planning methods. Now, for the most part, the stigma has fallen away.
“Those days it was a bit difficult,” Mpacha said through translation. “Women would keep quiet when we knocked on the doors. Now, they even come to my house for family planning.”
Mpacha is on the frontlines of family planning education and services as an interpersonal communications agent (IPC) for PSI’s Familia program, a social franchise network of clinics across Tanzania. Working three days per week and reaching upwards of 200 women per month, Mama Blandina dedicated her life to helping women with family planning early on after meeting a 19-year-old woman who already had three children. Educating and referring girls as young as 16 for family planning services can be tough work Mpacha admitted and can be a “bit difficult”. Her allowance is 77,000 Tanzanian shillings per month; not enough to live on. If there is one thing that can be improved, it’s her pay, she said. “It can be increased.” Furthermore, when Blandina Mpacha visits her clients’ homes she must take a customary gift. All of those gifts, she said, must come out of her pocket which can be burdensome.
Despite the hard work, Blandina relishes being a longtime, popular fixture in her community. “I give it my best even if it’s at night,” she said.
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Global Health and Development Beat
Rights watchdog Amnesty International said that Africa’s most developed country, South Africa, still has “unacceptably” high numbers of women dying from largely avoidable deaths during pregnancy.
Ebola-hit Liberia has suspended nationwide elections in the latest measure to combat an epidemic which has shut down society in three west African nations, restricting travel and forcing the cancellation of public events.
The world could be a lot less safe for mothers after 2015. As the deadline for the MDGs approaches, advocates for maternal health say the issue is in danger of fading in future models of sustainability.
As waters continue to recede after floods that have affected more than 2.5 million Pakistanis, health experts warn a further crisis may be unfolding with thousands of communities at risk of vector and water-borne disease.
More than a million Syrian refugees in Turkey may go without food, medicine and shelter unless there is an increase in international funding, the U.N. refugee agency said.
The UN’s Palestinian refugee agency is to make its largest ever financial plea to donors, it said on Thursday, asking for $1.6 billion to rehabilitate war-battered Gaza.
The Red Cross said Thursday fresh violence in the Central African Republic was preventing its work to help civilians, especially with its aid workers threatened by gunmen.
World food prices have hit a four-year low, a UN agency reported on Thursday, with record harvests breathing new hope into the fight against hunger, though some “hunger hotspots” remain.
The Ethiopian government has nominated 90-year-old Dr. Catherine Hamlin for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize. The doctor has been running a fistula clinic for 40 years, VOA reports.
People are living longer than ever before. In the United States, life expectancy has gone up once more to 79 years and 9.5 months and death rates have fallen, reports NPR.
Kenya is leading in child trafficking in the region with babies who are days to be born being booked by illegal dealers while others who are days old are sold for as little as Sh2,000, a new study has shown.
The Red Cross said Thursday it was analyzing how to resume its Ukraine operations a week after halting work in the conflict-torn country following the death of a Swiss staffer.
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Buzzing in the Blogs
One DJ in Sierra Leone is taking on the issue of Ebola through his weekly radio show. From the Guardian Development blog:
The Ebola outbreak was sparked by a bewitched aircraft that crashed in a remote part of Sierra Leone, casting a spell over three west African countries, but a heavily alcoholic drink called bitter Kola can cure the virus.
These are just two of the rumours dispelled on Amara Bangura’s weekly radio show, which is broadcast on 35 stations across the country.
“You have to deal with the issues of myth, you have to deal with the issues of religion, you have to answer questions about prevention and how to stay safe,” said Bangura.
The DJ selects questions from thousands of text messages sent in from around the country and puts them to health experts and government officials. “Our radio programme has been very useful in helping people change their attitudes,” he said, noting that not all Sierra Leoneans are following guidelines aimed at preventing the spread of Ebola.
Bangura, who is from one of Sierra Leone’s worst-hit districts, believes officials must engage with communities to alter deeply entrenched beliefs that lead people to seek religious counsel instead of medical treatment.
“We’ve been telling them if you experience any signs or symptoms of Ebola, please go to the medical hospital,” he said. “Don’t go to the church or the mosque, you’re not going to get treatment there. You can pray as much as you can but go to the hospital for treatment.”
Bangura added that his radio show is an integral part of the Ebola response: “Everybody listens to the radio and it’s the best way to communicate with people. You want to reach out to people in rural areas – they don’t have access to newspapers, they don’t have access to television – and you want to talk to people in a language they understand in a simple way.”
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Capital Events
Friday
10:00 AM – Mental Health Needs in a Humanitarian Crisis – Kaiser Family Foundation and The Global Mental Health Advocacy Working Group
12:30 PM – Food for the Future: Achieving Food Security in the Face of Climate Change – World Bank
Friday – 17 October
8:30 AM – Ensuring Equity for NCDs in Women’s Health Throughout the Life Course – FHI 360
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By Mark Leon Goldberg and Tom Murphy
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Disclaimer: Opinions presented in this email do not necessarily reflect the views of PSI.
