Nigeria

In-Depth report on lessons to be learned from the Ebola crisis

THE WASHINGTON POST by By Lena H. Sun, Brady Dennis and Joel Achenbach                            Dec. 29, 2014

A year after it began, the Ebola epidemic in West Africa continues to be unpredictable, forcing governments and aid groups to improvise strategies as they chase a virus that is unencumbered by borders or bureaucracy.

The people fighting Ebola are coming up with lists of lessons learned — not only for the current battle, which has killed more than 7,500 people and is far from over, but also for future outbreaks of deadly contagions.

Alice Jallabah, head of a bushmeat seller group, holds dried bushmeat in Monrovia. (Zoom Dosso/AFP/Getty Images)

BBC                                                                                                                       Dec. 22 2014

Spending cuts imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) may have contributed to the rapid spread of Ebola in three West African states, UK-based researchers say.

                      Sierra Leone, along with Liberia and Guinea, have poor health facilities

It had led to "under-funded, insufficiently staffed, and poorly prepared health systems" in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, they said.

The IMF denied the allegation.

"A major reason why the Ebola outbreak spread so rapidly was the weakness of healthcare systems in the region, and it would be unfortunate if underlying causes were overlooked," said Cambridge University sociologist and lead study author Alexander Kentikelenis....

The IMF said in a statement that health spending in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone had, in fact, increased in the 2010-2013 period.

MEDICAL NEWS TODAY                                                                                                 Dec. 9, 2014

LONDON --Thanks to increased disease control, global deaths to malaria have fallen dramatically, and the number of new cases is steadily declining, say the World Health Organization in a new report. Also, an increasing number of countries are moving toward eliminating the mosquito-borne disease altogether. But the UN agency warns these gains are fragile, and no more so than in countries worse-affected by the Ebola crisis.

The 2014 World Health Organization (WHO) report says deaths to malaria worldwide fell by 47% between 2000 and 2013. In the WHO African Region, where 90% of deaths to malaria occur, the reduction is 54%.

Archived Video - Watch the meeting held on Tuesday, December 9, 2014, from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. (ET).

Speakers: Nancy A. Aossey, President and Chief Executive Officer, International Medical Corps

Laurie Garrett, Senior Fellow for Global Health, Council on Foreign Relations; Author, Ebola: Story of an Outbreak

David Nabarro, Special Envoy on Ebola, United Nations

Presider: Richard E. Besser, Chief Health and Medical Editor, ABC News

Experts recently returned from trips to West Africa with medical teams operating Ebola-treatment units there discuss the situation on the ground and developments in the international response to the crisis.

CLICK HERE - Council on Foreign Relations - Ebola Update: Assessment From Africa

CLICK HERE - YouTube - Council on Foreign Relations - Ebola Update: Assessment From Africa