Cotonou, 5 November 2014 – The World Health Organization’s (WHO) Regional Director for Africa,  Dr Luis Sambo, has proposed key actions to be implemented by countries in the African Region to tackle the Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreak currently occurring in some West African countries.

The actions include strengthening national capacity to detect EVD outbreaks, providing care to patients and ensuring the effective infection prevention and control measures are in place at all health facilities.

The proposed action also urges countries to involve communities early and raise awareness and knowledge on EVD, ensure that national preparedness and response plans are developed and tested as well as establish treatment centres to cater for health workers infected with Ebola in host countries.

Dr Sambo’s proposal is contained in a report presented to the 64th Session of the WHO Regional Committee for Africa taking place in Cotonou, Benin Republic.

The report highlights some of the lessons learnt from the current EVD outbreak. These are inadequate public awareness leading to resistance; inadequate capacity for early detection of and rapid response to the EVD outbreak; inadequate capacity for treatment and infection prevention and control; inadequate linkages between health facilities and communities and lack of resources and inadequate coordination and collaboration:

The report also states that, the main issues that countries are confronted with during the on-going epidemic are related to the uniqueness of the epidemic; community awareness, cultural beliefs and practices; weak health systems capacity in the affected countries; inadequate logistic capacity; resource mobilization and coordination; international travel restrictions; and equity and development.

The report calls on countries to establish dialogue with opinion leaders; enhance coordination and resource mobilization and address the social determinants of health. The countries were also urged to honour their commitment towards the African Public Health Fund (APHEF). 

During the discussions, Member States thanked countries and partners for the solidarity shown in addressing the Ebola outbreak. They underscored the need to address issues such as leadership and coordination, weakness of health systems, stigmatization of countries and the people affected by the EVD, border closures and sub-optimal implementation of the available WHO policies, strategies to strengthen health systems.

In response, the Regional Director called upon partners, technical agencies and public health institutions to participate actively in the response EVD activities in line with the identified country priorities by providing technical and financial support to the EVD-affected countries as well as countries at risk of EVD. 

He added that WHO, for its part, will among others support countries to implement their National preparedness and response plans, upgrade and get accreditation for their national laboratories to levels appropriate for Ebola diagnosis and work with the African Union Commission (AUC) in accelerating the establishment of the African Centre for Disease Control.

The current epidemic has been compounded by the virus spreading from rural areas to densely populated urban towns. Concerned by the worsening situation, the UN Security Council recently declared the EVD epidemic as a threat to international peace and security.

_________________________________________

For further information contact:

Dr Youssouf Gamatié
Tel: + 229 301753 
Email: gamatiey [at] who.int

Dr Francis Kasolo 
Tel+ 229 61694092
Email: kasolof [at] who.int

C. Boakye-Agyemang  
Tel: +229 60694057  +242 066142401 
Email: boakyeagyemangc [at] who.int

François Agossou 
Tel : + 229 301753 ; + 229 97290254  
Email: agossouf [at] who.int

Samuel Ajibola  
Tel: +4724139174  
Email: ajibolas [at] who.int

Ebola Virus disease outbreak in West Africa: Update and lessons learnt