country:sierra leone

Mali’s double whammy

MALI thought it had got off lightly. As the #Ebola epidemic claimed thousands of lives across the border to the south in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, #Mali recorded just a single case of the virus. It was carried by an infected two-year-old girl, who had been brought by her grandmother from Guinea, travelling 1,200km (745 miles) by bus and taxi with the feverish child. She died in hospital in the city of Kayes on October 24th (see WHO situation report here).

http://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/full-width/images/2014/11/articles/body/20141115_map502_0.jpg

Les survivants d’#Ebola participent à l’amélioration de la lutte contre la maladie

FREETOWN/KAILAHUN/MONROVIA/DAKAR, 14 novembre 2014 (IRIN) - L’épidémie d’Ebola a fait près de 5 000 morts en Guinée, au Liberia et en Sierra Leone, mais de nombreux malades ont survécu et jouent un rôle clé dans la lutte contre la maladie.

▻http://www.irinnews.org/fr/reportfrench.aspx?ReportID=100845

Améliorer les capacités de #diagnostic d’#Ebola

FREETOWN/DAKAR, 13 novembre 2014 (IRIN) - Selon les organisations d’aide humanitaire et les travailleurs de la santé, des lacunes importantes dans les infrastructures « de second plan » augmentent le temps de réponse et entravent les efforts pour endiguer la maladie en Guinée, au Liberia et en Sierra Leone.

▻http://www.irinnews.org/fr/reportfrench.aspx?ReportID=100836

#Ebola : le #PNUD appelle à agir pour éviter un #effondrement_économique régional

7 octobre 2014 – Au début d’une visite de 10 jours dans les pays les plus touchés par l’épidémie d’Ebola (Guinée, Sierra Leone et Libéria), un haut responsable du Programme des Nations Unies pour le développement (PNUD) a déclaré lundi qu’il fallait tout faire pour que cette crise sanitaire ne devienne pas une crise socio-économique régionale.

▻http://www.un.org/africarenewal/fr/derni%C3%A8re-heure/ebola-le-pnud-appelle-%C3%A0-agir-pour-%C3%A9viter-un-effondrement-%C3%A9conomiq

How the Speed of Response Defined the #Ebola Crisis
▻http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/11/04/health/visuals-ebola-model.html

These charts are based on an epidemiological model created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, using figures from Liberia and Sierra Leone, two of the countries hit hardest by the epidemic. In the third, Guinea, case counts have been unreliable.

Large-scale intervention did not begin until late August and early September, and the C.D.C. model suggests that was too late to stop the epidemic from killing tens of thousands of people — and perhaps many more — by the end of the year. Had successful interventions been started much earlier, the total number of cases would have remained below 5,000.

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MSF doctor writes about experiences working in #Ebola zone in #Sierra_Leone
▻http://africasacountry.com/msf-doctor-writes-about-experiences-working-in-ebola-zone-in-sierra

Before arriving in an Ebola project, most MSF expatriates have to go through two days of intensive training. An important part of this is putting on the full personal protective equipment (PPE). Dressing up for the first time is incredibly uncomfortable, essentially covering your entire body in plastic, tying a waterproof hood around your head, […]

#DEVELOPMENT_&_AID #EDITORIAL #top_menu_item #Doctor's_Without_Borders #medicine_sans_frontières

EBOLA • La Sierra Leone à bout de forces et de moyens

A Freetown, dans toute la ville, il n’y a pas un bâtiment, un véhicule ou une personne qui ne soit impliqué dans la lutte contre #Ebola. La capitale de la Sierra Leone vit sous le joug du virus. Le pays enregistre plus de 5 200 cas sur les 13 700 cas mondiaux recensés par l’Organisation mondiale de la santé (OMS).

http://www.courrierinternational.com/files/imagecache/ulysse_une/2014/10/3110-uneguardian-ebola.jpg

#Sierra_Leone

Obama Has Been Fighting Doctors Without Borders For Years
▻http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/29/obama-doctors-without-borders_n_6068634.html

When President Barack Obama lauded the “incredible heroism” of American doctors who travel to countries such as Sierra Leone to do “God’s work” and “keep us safe,” on Tuesday, he was celebrating a community packed with Doctors Without Borders volunteers. United Nations Ambassador Samantha Power has been more explicit, using the acronym for the international group’s French name, Medicines Sans Frontiers, in speeches and on Twitter.(...)

But the recent executive branch acclaim for Doctors Without Borders obscures a long-running struggle between the humanitarian group and the White House over global drug prices.

#MSF #médicaments #prix #brevets

#Accaparement_des_terres : une négociation s’engage entre le groupe Bolloré et les riverains de ses plantations en Afrique et en Asie
▻http://multinationales.org/Accaparement-des-terres-une

Des paysans et villageois du #Sierra_Leone, de #Côte_d'Ivoire, du #Cameroun et du #Cambodge sont venus spécialement jusqu’à Paris pour l’occasion. Pour la première fois, le groupe Bolloré et sa filiale luxembourgeoise #Socfin, qui gère des plantations industrielles de palmiers à huile et d’hévéas (pour le caoutchouc) en Afrique et en Asie, ont accepté de participer à des négociations avec les #communautés_locales. À l’ordre du jour, un sujet sensible : celui de l’« #accaparement » des terres occasionné par les (...)

Actualités

/ Bolloré, Socfin, Accaparement des terres, #impact_social, #impact_sur_l'environnement, accaparement, #agriculture, communautés locales, Sierra Leone, Cambodge, Cameroun, Côte (...)

#Bolloré
« ▻http://projet-react.org »
« ▻http://economie.jeuneafrique.com/regions/afrique-subsaharienne/23371-accaparement-des-terres-bollore-accepte-decouter-les-re »
« ►http://www.bastamag.net/Bollore-Credit-agricole-Louis »

Etats-Unis : Ebola devient une affaire d’Etat - Amériques - RFI

▻http://www.rfi.fr/ameriques/20141028-etats-unis-ebola-devient-une-affaire-etat-obama-maison-blanche-kaci-hickox-quaran/?ns_campaign=nl_MONDE281014&ns_mchannel=newsletter&ns_source=emailvision&ns_link

Les soldats américains de retour de la zone touchée par la fièvre Ebola en Afrique de l’Ouest, seront désormais placés en quarantaine sur une base en Italie, avant de pouvoir rentrer.

▻http://scd.rfi.fr/sites/filesrfi/imagecache/rfi_16x9_1024_578/sites/images.rfi.fr/files/aef_image/2014-10-27T152128Z_2128426972_GM1EAAR1SLO01_RTRMADP_3_HEALTH-EBOLA-USA_0.JPG

Dans le même temps, l’infirmière de retour de Sierra Leone, et qui avait été placée en quarantaine contre son gré dans un hôpital du New Jersey, a été autorisée à rentrer chez elle. Les annonces contradictoires qui se succèdent ne rassurent pas les Américains.

#ebola #états-unis

We can no longer ignore Ebola’s wider impact – particularly on women | Jeanne Kamara | Global development | theguardian.com
▻http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2014/oct/14/ebola-women-sierra-leone

Women make up 51% of Sierra Leone’s population: they are the key to the country’s social and economic development. This is why gender activists and women’s advocacy groups in the country have joined forces in urging leaders to address the disproportionate effect of Ebola on the female population. It is estimated that 60% of the total fatalities in west Africa have been women (pdf); in Liberia, the figure is reportedly as high as 75%.

In Sierra Leone’s patriarchal society, women are the primary care-givers at home and in the community. Custom dictates that they tend to sick family members, nurse children and work as traditional healers and healthcare assistants. It is sisters, daughters, aunts, mothers and grandmothers who have selflessly cared for relatives infected with Ebola; unwittingly, they have put themselves at great risk.

#Ebola #femmes

Freetown est-il en train de livrer un combat perdu d’avance contre #Ebola ?

Le témoignage suivant est celui de la journaliste d’IRIN Anna Jefferys qui s’est rendue en Sierra Leone dernièrement en compagnie du réalisateur Ricci Shyrock. Il s’agit du troisième volet d’une série en trois parties. Vous pouvez lire ici le premier volet et ici le deuxième volet.

▻http://www.irinnews.org/fr/reportfrench.aspx?ReportID=100740

I volunteered to fight Ebola in Sierra Leone with MSF. Here’s what happened | Natasha Lewer | theguardian.com
▻http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/20/volunteered-fight-ebola-sierra-leone-msf

I’ve never met people who work so hard. The medics are reprimanded for staying too long inside the high-risk zone. Anything over an hour becomes physiologically dangerous. It’s so hot inside the layers of protective clothing that by the time you come out, you have to pour the sweat out of your boots.

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Pleas to major powers from Ebola-stricken countries, health professionals fall on deaf ears - World Socialist Web Site

▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/10/20/ebol-o20.html

Pleas to major powers from Ebola-stricken countries, health professionals fall on deaf ears

By Patrick Martin
20 October 2014

The world’s political and economic elite, the financial aristocracy that dominates the global capitalist system, will take only token measures to help the millions who face sickness and death in the Ebola epidemic ravaging West Africa. This is clear from the dismal response to appeals from doctors, nurses and aid workers fighting the epidemic, and from leaders of the three hardest-hit countries, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) on Sunday broadcast a “letter to the world” from Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf warning that the Ebola virus “respects no borders” and that a generation of Africans are at risk of “being lost to economic catastrophe” because of the impact of the disease on entire societies.

#ebola

#Ebola #Virus Disease in West Africa — The First 9 Months of the Epidemic and Forward Projections
▻http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1411100#t=articleBackground

Although the current epidemic of EVD in West Africa is unprecedented in scale, the clinical course of infection and the transmissibility of the virus are similar to those in previous EVD outbreaks. The incubation period, duration of illness, case fatality rate, and R 0 are all within the ranges reported for previous EVD epidemics.7,13-18 Our estimates of R 0 are similar to other recent estimates for this West Africa epidemic.19-23 The combination of signs and symptoms recorded between symptom onset and clinical presentation is also similar to that in other reports.14,17,24-26 We infer that the present epidemic is exceptionally large, not principally because of the biologic characteristics of the virus, but rather because of the attributes of the affected populations and because control efforts have been insufficient to halt the spread of infection.

Certain characteristics of the affected populations may have led to the rapid geographic dissemination of infection. The populations of Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone are highly interconnected, with much cross-border traffic at the epicenter and relatively easy connections by road between rural towns and villages and between densely populated national capitals. The large intermixing population has facilitated the spread of infection, but a large epidemic was not inevitable. In Nigeria, the number of cases has so far been limited, despite the introduction of infection into the large cities of Lagos (approximately 20 million people) and Port Harcourt (>1 million people). The critical determinant of epidemic size appears to be the speed of implementation of rigorous control measures.

(...)

Notwithstanding the geographic variation in case incidence within and among Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, the current epidemiologic outlook is bleak. Forward projections suggest that unless control measures — including improvements in contact tracing, adequate case isolation, increased capacity for clinical management, safe burials, greater community engagement, and support from international partners — improve quickly, these three countries will soon be reporting thousands of cases and deaths each week, projections that are similar to those of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Experimental therapeutics and vaccines offer promise for the future but are unlikely to be available in the quantities needed to make a substantial difference in control efforts for many months, even if they are proved to be safe and effective. Furthermore, careful assessment of the most effective means of utilizing such interventions (e.g., vaccination or treatment of contacts versus health care workers) will be required while stocks remain limited. For the medium term, at least, we must therefore face the possibility that EVD will become endemic among the human population of West Africa, a prospect that has never previously been contemplated. The risk of continued epidemic expansion and the prospect of endemic EVD in West Africa call for the most forceful implementation of present control measures and for the rapid development and deployment of new drugs and vaccines.

#Afrique #santé

#Ebola: Where we are; where we should be
▻http://africasacountry.com/ebola-where-we-are-where-we-should-be

Is it coincidental that the so-called Ebola humanitarian crisis—dubbed global complex emergency by the West—is unfolding on the upper Guinea coast the site of intense activities during the European slave trade? Is it coincidental that the upper Guinea Coast, or precisely the Mano River Basin, which include two Pan-African state projects, #Sierra_Leone and #Liberia, […]

#BREAKING #DEVELOPMENT_&_AID #POLITICS #aid #development #Governance #health #Industry

Cuba donne l’exemple dans la lutte contre Ebola
▻http://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2014/10/18/cuba-donne-l-exemple-dans-la-lutte-contre-ebola_4508408_3244.html

En dépit de ses difficultés économiques et de ses maigres moyens, Cuba s’est projeté à l’avant-garde de la lutte contre le virus Ebola en dépêchant un important contingent de personnel soignant en Afrique de l’Ouest au moment où les grandes nations laissent généralement la main aux humanitaires.

Perpétuant sa tradition médicale internationaliste, un contingent de 165 médecins et personnels de santé cubains est parti début octobre vers la Sierra Leone, alors que 296 autres personnels sont attendus prochainement au Liberia et en Guinée voisins. Les effectifs médicaux cubains constituent le plus grand contingent dépêché par un Etat pour combattre Ebola.

Cette initiative est largement saluée par l’ONU, l’Organisation mondiale de la santé (OMS) et plusieurs associations humanitaires, alors que les grandes nations se contentent actuellement de contributions financières et de mesures de protection frontalières. Sur le terrain, ils laissent les humanitaires et agences onusiennes tenter de juguler l’épidémie, à l’exception notable des Etats-Unis qui ont dépêché sur place une aide militaire d’envergure (4 000 soldats prévus).

Rompant avec l’habituel ton peu amène envers Cuba, le secrétaire d’Etat américain John Kerry a lui-même adressé vendredi des remerciements à Cuba pour son aide dans la lutte internationale contre le virus.

Selon le dernier bilan de l’OMS, la fièvre hémorragique a fait 4 555 morts sur 9 216 cas enregistrés dans sept pays (Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinée, Nigeria, Sénégal, Espagne et Etats-Unis), et l’organisation onusienne craint une envolée du nombre de contaminations.

« La tâche de ceux qui partent combattre Ebola pour la survie d’autres êtres humains est difficile, au péril même de leur propre vie », dramatisait le 4 octobre l’ex-président Fidel Castro dans la presse locale. Depuis 1960, date à laquelle Cuba avait envoyé pour la première fois un contingent de médecins après un tremblement de terre au Chili, le régime communiste des frères Fidel et Raul Castro a dépêché pas moins de 135 000 effectifs médicaux à travers le monde.

Aujourd’hui encore, quelque 50 000 médecins et personnels de santé effectuent des « missions » dans 66 pays d’Amérique latine, d’Afrique et d’Asie, selon le ministère cubain de la Santé. Depuis la chute du bloc soviétique, l’aide dans le secteur de la santé a été l’une des clés de voûte de la diplomatie cubaine, visant généralement les pays en développement et ses partenaires privilégiés. A partir de 2004, Cuba a commencé à facturer ses services aux pays récepteurs, procurant à l’île communiste une de ses principales sources de revenus.

L’Amérique latine, pour l’heure épargnée par l’épidémie, pourrait ne pas l’être très longtemps, alors que l’OMS craint un décuplement des nouveaux cas d’ici la fin de l’année. Des cas suspects ont été enregistrés au Brésil et au Chili.

Modeling the Impact of Interventions on an Epidemic of Ebola in Sierra Leone and Liberia – PLOS Currents Outbreaks
▻http://currents.plos.org/outbreaks/article/obk-14-0043-modeling-the-impact-of-interventions-on-an-epidemic-of-eb

The basic reproduction number (R0) for the baseline scenario was calculated in the same manner as in Legrand et al.10 Briefly, R0 is broken into three components, representing the respective contributions of community, hospital and funereal transmissions, as well as an overall R0 reflecting the epidemic potential for the disease. In the baseline scenario, we estimate an overall R0 of 2.22, made up of an R0 of 1.35 from the community, 0.35 from hospitals and 0.53 from funerals for Liberia. Sierra Leone’s R0 was estimated to be 1.78, made up of an R0 of 1.11 from the community, 0.24 from hospitals and 0.43 from funerals.

http://currents.plos.org/outbreaks/files/2014/09/LiberiaCombinedTrajectory.png

Genomes reveal start of Ebola outbreak

▻http://www.sciencemag.org/content/345/6200/989.full

When the young woman arrived at the Kenema Government Hospital in Sierra Leone in late May, she had high fever and had just miscarried. The hospital suspected she had contracted Lassa fever, because the viral disease is endemic in the region and often causes miscarriages. But Ebola virus disease, another hemorrhagic fever illness, had been spreading in neighboring Guinea for months, so when she began bleeding profusely, staff tested her for that virus as well. The results were positive, making her the first confirmed case of Ebola in Sierra Leone.

The young woman, who eventually recovered, is now at the heart of a tragic but potentially important research tale. In a paper online this week in Science, a collaboration led by Stephen Gire and Pardis Sabeti of Harvard University and the Broad Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts, report sequencing and analyzing the genomes of Ebola virus samples from 78 people in Sierra Leone who were diagnosed with Ebola between late May and mid-June, including the young woman who came to Kenema’s hospital. The 99 complete sequences—some patients were sampled more than once—provide insights into how the virus is changing during the outbreak, which could help improve current diagnostic tests and, in the long term, guide researchers working on vaccines and treatments.

#ebola

World Health Organization says Ebola cases could reach 10,000 per week - World Socialist Web Site

▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/10/15/ebol-o15.html

World Health Organization says Ebola cases could reach 10,000 per week

By Andre Damon
15 October 2014

The number of new Ebola cases in Africa could grow as high as 10,000 per week, ten times higher than earlier estimates, according to projections the World Health Organization (WHO) reported Tuesday.

Dr. Bruce Aylward, who heads the WHO response to the crisis, said the public health organization now estimates the mortality rate in the countries affected by the outbreak—Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea—to be around 70 percent. Even though earlier statistics had shown a survival rate of around fifty percent, the UN-affiliated organization is now recording “at best 30 percent survival,” he said.

#ebola

Believe It Or Not, #Cuba Is Providing The Most Aid For #Ebola Of Any Country
►http://elitedaily.com/news/world/cuba-provides-ebola-aid-video/792353

The US has sent hundreds of military personnel to combat the Ebola virus, but when it comes to actual healthcare workers, it’s Cuba that has delivered the most help.

Over 160 Cuban doctors and nurses touched down in Sierra Leone last Thursday, the Washington Post reports, the largest medical team from a single country to arrive in West Africa since the outbreak began last March.

An additional 296 Cuban healthcare workers will be sent to Liberia and Guinea after undergoing training to become more familiar with the virus, which has killed at least 3,300 people.

♥ Cuba

‘A teenage girl bled to death over two days’: Ebola nurses describe life and death on the frontline | World news | The Guardian

▻http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/13/ebola-nurses-describe-life-death-on-frontline-liberia-sierra-leone

‘A teenage girl bled to death over two days’: Ebola nurses describe life and death on the frontline
West Africa is battling the biggest known outbreak of Ebola, with experts predicting there could be 1.4 million cases by January. Three nurses who volunteered to help fight the virus in Liberia and Sierra Leone, the worst-affected countries, describe the daily horror

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2014/10/13/1413215824883/A-health-worker-is-decont-011.jpg

#ebola

Living with Ebola in West Africa - The Big Picture - The Boston Globe
▻http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/bigpicture/2014/10/08/living-with-ebola-west-africa/vTCGB1bQTSbQitjUkSsTWI/story.html?p1=BP_MainPhoto

Galerie de 25 photos

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The shoes of a suspected Ebola patient are seen after being cordoned off with stones by local residents in Freetown, Sierra Leone, on Sept. 24. U.S. health officials Tuesday laid out worst-case and best-case scenarios for the Ebola epidemic in West Africa, warning that the number of infected people could explode to at least 1.4 million by mid-January or peak well below that, if efforts to control the outbreak are ramped up. (Michael Duff/Associated Press)

#ebola

L’accession de la Palestine à la CPI est une nécessité, selon Desmond Da Silva (procureur en chef du tribunal pénal sur la Sierra Leone) et Geoffrey Nice, procureur du tribunal international sur l’ex-Yougoslavie ▻http://www.liberation.fr/monde/2014/10/11/la-lutte-contre-l-impunite-un-element-cle-de-la-paix-au-proche-orient_111

#palestine#CPI#tribunal#israël

World powers stand by as Ebola death toll passes 4,000 - World Socialist Web Site

▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/10/11/ebol-o11.html

World powers stand by as Ebola death toll passes 4,000
By Niles Williamson
11 October 2014

The World Health Organization (WHO) reported on Friday that the death toll in the ongoing Ebola epidemic continues to rise with 4,033 deaths out of 8,399 cases in seven countries. Except for one case in the US state of Texas, all of the deaths have occurred in the West African countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria. According to the latest report by the WHO, there is no evidence that current efforts have been able to bring the epidemic under control.

#ebola