Presence of Ebola team in Ghana; No lives at risk
The Head of the United Nations (UN) Mission on Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), Mr Anthony Banbury, has given an assurance that the presence of the mission in Ghana will not put the country at risk.
According to him, the team was ready to follow any stringent and rigid measures that would be put in place by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Ministry of Health (MoH) to check its travels from Ghana to Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, the three countries affected by the Ebola disease.
Addressing a press conference in Accra yesterday, Mr Banbury said the team, which will provide mainly technical and logistical support for the affected countries, would not work directly with infected people in the three countries.
What is Ebola?
Ebola is a severe, often fatal, illness, with a death rate of up to 90 per cent.
The disease is introduced into the human population through close contact with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected animals.
According to Mr Banbury, the WHO was putting in place stringent protocols on how the team would travel, saying that those protocols would be set higher than the current standards that had been set for all other travellers.
He, however, said in the event of any of the team members contracting the deadly virus, that person would be evacuated to the United States of America (USA).
He said if the world did not respond to the current crisis, the death toll would rise to over 1.4 million by January 2015, a situation which, he said, was going to affect all countries in the world.
“The world must act now to stop Ebola,” he said.
The team, he said, needed about nine to 12 months to complete its mission.
Mission of UNMEER
The UN Security Council, in its first emergency meeting on a public health crisis in New York on September 18, 2014, declared the Ebola outbreak in West Africa a threat to peace and security.
The UNMEER is the emergency health mission deployed by the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, to combat one of the most horrific diseases on the planet that has shattered the lives of millions.
The international mission has five priorities — stopping the outbreak, treating the infected, ensuring essential services, preserving stability and preventing further outbreaks.
The mission brings together UN actors and experts who are to support national efforts in the affected countries.
In all, the team will be made up of 250 personnel, out of which 100 will be based in Accra, which has been designated the headquarters of the UN’s Ebola Emergency Response, while the remaining 150 will be deployed to the affected countries.
Support to combat Ebola
Mr Banbury said there was the need for international support from all angles if the Ebola virus was to be tackled effectively.
“No single state or organisation can stop the effect of this virus; we need a coalition,” he said.
He said the mission would help strengthen the logistical needs of the affected countries, including vehicles, medical supplies, as well as other forms of technical support that could help control and eventually stop further tranmission of the virus.
He said part of its work would be to ensure that there were no unmet needs in the affected countries.
Mr Banbury said the team would work closely with the governments of the affected countries, as well as non-governmental organisations working in the area of Ebola eradication.
He said it needed the mobilisation of international political will to help it in its work and provide resources in terms of money and medical personnel to fight the disease on all fronts.
He said it also needed action on the ground by the affected countries, as the team was going to focus its work on already-established health policies and interventions with robust logistical support.
How Ebola can be stopped
Citing WHO standards, Mr Banbury said Ebola could only be stopped if 70 per cent of all infected people received prompt medical care.
A further 70 per cent of all deaths, he said, needed to be buried properly if the disease was to be contained.
Those, he said, were ambitious targets but “we have no other choice”.
To forestall future disease outbreaks, Mr Banbury said, the WHO, the UN and governments needed to put in place measures for early detection and disease surveillance.
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