World Bank/Vincent Tremeau
Health workers put their Personal Protective Equipment on before entering the zone
where people suspected of having Ebola are held in quarantine to be monitored and
treated at the Ebola Transition Centre (January 2019)
28 May 2019
Health
Although the Ebola response in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) continues
to make headway thanks to the determination of health workers on the ground, insecurity
is still hampering the response, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday.
This has led the UN to establish a new coordination structure in the hopes that access to
at-risk areas can be improved.
“We are seeing a dramatic increase over the past few months in the number of security
incidents in the area of North Kivu, which lies at the epicentre of this ebola
outbreak,” said Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO Regional Director for Africa, to journalists
in Geneva as she recalled the brutal killing of a WHO colleague in mid-April.
She added that on Saturday, another attack took place during which another health worker
was killed.
Insecurity equals lack of access
So far, in 2019, there have been 174 attacks against health care facilities or workers.
That’s a three-fold increase compared to the number of attacks that took place during
the previous five-month period (August through December 2018).
“Insecurity really is what is making the response to this Ebola outbreak so challenging
and also so unpredictable,” she insisted, adding. “And this insecurity leads to a lack of
access and that is really what is driving the increase in cases. When the response
can’t reach people, they don’t get the chance to be vaccinated or to receive life-saving
treatments if they do fall ill.”
Currently, the DRC’s worst ever outbreak of the deadly virus has seen 1,920 Ebola
cases overall, including 1,281 deaths. Despite the risks, the more than 700 workers
deployed by WHO remain in the area working alongside other health teams providing
care.
“This Ebola response is one of the most complex health emergencies the world has
faced,” said Dr. Moeti, explaining that “the authority of the Government is not strong,
and what further complicates the situation is that there are many belligerents and armed
groups and parties, and it’s not always clear under whose leadership they are operating”.
A new UN coordinating structure
To strengthen the coordination of the response and “create a much more enabling
environment”, this week, the Deputy head of the DRC peacekeeping mission MONUSCO,
David Gressly – newly appointed UN Emergency Ebola Response Coordinator – will be
arriving in the city of Butembo, at the epicentre of the outbreak. Among several other key
objectives, his role will be to help strengthen the DRC Government’s engagement around
security, in a bid to reconcile various warring parties in the area.
In parallel, a scale-up of operations in the region from health and humanitarian organizations
is also expected.
“I’m hopeful that this new structure will bring the much-needed stability, safety and
clarity, and enable the response to proceed,” said Dr. Moeti.
Listen to our interview with David Gressly, the new Emergency Ebola Response
Coordinator:
‘Encouraging signs’
To date, more than 500 people have survived thanks to adequate care. In particular, transmissions
in medical centres (“nosocomial transmissions”), which represented 35 per cent of all transmissions
just a few weeks ago, which are now down to 5 per cent.
“That number is still too high, we still want to reach for zero,” said Dr. Michael Ryan,
chief of WHO’s Health Emergencies Programme.
Enhanced community engagement efforts continue to be put in place with 21 community
Ebola committees in place so far, and vaccinations are also ongoing thanks to pop-up centres.
Currently, 95 per cent of people offered vaccinations are accepting them and 90 per cent of
families are agreeing to “safe and dignified burials”.
Dr. Ryan also explained that efforts in improving the surveillance and tracing of cases are
also showing progress with 1,400 alerts per day on average, a number that was only half
of that six weeks ago. The number of samples taken daily for laboratory analysis is also
increasing steadily with the proportion of positive cases decreasing.
In another “encouraging sign”, Monday was “the first day in a very long time that we
had zero positive cases among community deaths”, said Dr. Ryan, as he gave credit
to the “brave frontline workers who risk their lives every day to do this work and to
our communities who are very much engaged and participating in the response.”
Watch the full press briefing here:
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