In an
effort to interrupt further spread of this virus in the shortest possible time,
the World Health Organization convened an Emergency Ministerial meeting in
Accra, Ghana from 2-3 July 2014 involving eleven (11) countries mostly from
West Africa and a number of key international partners involved in the Ebola
outbreak response. The aim of the meeting was to discuss how to contain the
disease, share experiences and agree on a strategy for an accelerated operational
response to bring an end to the outbreak.
Accra, 03 July 2014 – The
Emergency Ministerial meeting on Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) has ended today with
Health Ministers agreeing on a range of priority actions to end the Ebola outbreak
in West Africa. The scale of the ongoing outbreak is unprecedented with reports
of over 750 cases and 445 deaths in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia since
March 2014.
In a
Communiqué issued at the end of the two-day meeting, the Ministers agreed that the
current situation poses a serious threat to all countries in the region and
beyond and called for immediate action. They expressed concern on the adverse
social and economic impact of the outbreak and stressed the need for
coordinated actions by all stakeholders, national leadership, enhanced
cross-border collaboration and community participation in the response.
In spite of the ongoing efforts to tackle the outbreak, there was consensus that a number of gaps and challenges remain. These relate to coordination of the outbreak, financing, communication, cross border collaboration, logistics, case management, infection control, surveillance, contact tracing, community participation and research.
The
Ministers adopted a common inter-country strategy, which highlights the
following key priority actions for the affected countries:
·
Convene national
inter-sectoral meetings involving key government ministries, national technical
committees and other stakeholders to map out a plan for immediate
implementation of the strategy.
·
Mobilise
community, religious, political leaders to improve awareness, and the
understanding of the disease
·
Strengthen
surveillance, case finding reporting and contact tracing
·
Deploy additional
national human resources with the relevant qualifications to key hot spots.
·
Identify and
commit additional domestic financial resources
·
Organise
cross-border consultations to facilitate exchange of information
·
Work and share
experiences with countries that have previously managed Ebola outbreaks in the
spirit of south-south cooperation
The
delegates also urged partners to continue providing technical and financial
support and work with WHO to effectively coordinate the response. In an effort
to promote regional leadership, and highlight the seriousness of the outbreak,
the delegates strongly recommended that the forthcoming Economic Community of
West African States (ECOWAS) Heads of States summit addresses the issue of EVD
outbreak.
The current
Ebola outbreak has surpassed all other outbreaks in terms of cases, deaths and
geographic spread across Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
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