Ebola again in Liberia: Hope dampened but not destroyed
No complacency: The mood after 20 days without infections in Liberia may be dampened but hope is not destroyed by the newly confirmed case of Ebola in Monrovia. It is a stark reminder to keep up vigilance, attention and investments.
Almost half way through to the magic number of 42 – the number of days without new infections considered the minimum to declare a place “Ebola free” - a new case was confirmed on Monday in Liberia. The people of Liberia and the many international helpers in the country had started preparing to celebrate defeating the disease while in neighbouring Sierra Leone and Guinea the acute fight continues. Certainly this new case is disappointing. But hopefully something good will come out of this.
We cannot stop responding to this crisis until Ebola has been eradicated from West Africa.
Oxfam is responding to the Ebola outbreak and will contribute to the recovery. We plan to spend $43 million in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Mali, Gambia, Guinea Bissau and Senegal to help over 3.2 million people. In Liberia and Sierra Leone, we have reached over 1.1 million people through working with communities and supporting medical facilities with water, sanitation and cleaning equipment.
We know that to successfully tackle Ebola communities need to be fully involved in the fight. That’s why we are piloting bottom-up approaches where local people promote health messages to their own communities – we’ve seen how effective this is to improve understanding and change risky behavior. Without this, other aspects such as treatment, safe burials and contact tracing cannot work.
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Photo: Quarantined village in Sierra Leone. Credit: Carsten Völz/Oxfam, 21 March 2015
