The Public Health Division of the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care distributed a request for personnel assistance from the World Health Organization (WHO) and Global Outbreak and Alert Response Network (GOARN) in response to the outbreak of the Ebola virus in West Africa. If you, or someone you know is able to offer assistance, please email goarn@who.int and emergencymanagement.moh@ontario.ca
Additional Ebola virus disease (EVD) cases, and deaths continue to be reported from Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. As of 24 July 2014, the cumulative number of suspected, probable and confirmed EVD cases in the three countries is 1093, including 660 deaths. Details on the distribution and classification of the cases in each country are available on the World Health Organization (WHO) Disease Outbreak News (http://www.who.int/csr/don/en/) and on the EVD outbreak website (http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/en/).
The main areas where active transmission continues to occur include:
- Guinea: Gueckedou
- Sierra Leone: Kenema and Kailahun
- Liberia: Lofa and Montserrado
WHO is very concerned about the continuing EVD outbreak in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Guinea. Efforts are currently ongoing to strengthen all aspects of outbreak response in the three countries, and strengthen preparedness in neighbouring countries. The Ministries of Health in the affected countries have been responding to the outbreak in collaboration with WHO and Global Outbreak and Alert Response Network (GOARN) partners since March 2014. WHO and GOARN partners have been directly involved in field operations, and have been providing continuous support to the response in critical areas, including mobile field laboratories, and experts field epidemiology, in IPC, social mobilisation and anthropology, data management, clinical management of cases, communications and logistics. WHO wishes to acknowledge the important and valuable contribution of GOARN partners in the response so far.
Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone are urgently finalising revised national strategic plans to scale up outbreak response activities. Comprehensive support for the urgent implementation of these plans is critical to accelerate and sustain effective outbreak response in the field. The Regional Director of the WHO Regional Office for Africa (AFRO) is currently conducting a firsthand assessment of the outbreak and response challenges, and is meeting with senior health and government representatives, and partners to advocate for urgent scaling up of key outbreak response activities, including community engagement, public information and communications, improved infection prevention and control in health care facilities, case management, effective contact tracing, cross-border collaboration and effective coordination. (See also: http://www.afro.who.int/en/clusters-a-programmes/dpc/epidemic-a-pandemic-alert-andresponse/outbreak-news/4230-ebola-virus-disease-west-africa-23-july-2014.html)
Request for Additional Assistance
In light of the complex challenges presented by this outbreak, and the increasing epidemic trends in Sierra Leone and Liberia in particular, WHO is scaling up response activities and support to countries. Response activities and international support are expected to continue for several months. Additional surge capacity is being identified and deployed in the field from WHO Headquarters, Regional and Country Offices. Staff in the WHO Country Offices in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone have been repurposed to support the response. WHO has also issued a major donor appeal for additional funding to ensure support for the international outbreak response. Major partners in the response are also scaling up there capacity to support the outbreak response, including the IFRC, and MSF, and UN agencies. Risk and needs assessments are being conducted to determine critical priorities areas, and high risk areas in which to focus immediate additional response activities. WHO is working with countries, and partners to estimate number of national and international personnel that will be required in each of countries for the next three months. The speed of scaling 4 up response activities, and the ability to provide comprehensive support will have a critical impact on the overall needs. The additional number of international staff required from WHO and partner institutions in the next three months is estimated as follows:
- Guinea: 77 staffs
- Liberia: 90 staffs
- Sierra Leone: 98 staffs
WHO is urgently requesting the assistance of GOARN partners to identify additional staff members for deployment to above countries in West Africa. In the interest of resource planning for this protracted outbreak, please submit initial offers of support to goarn@who.int, with the following initial information:
- CV of candidate(s), clearly describing previous field experience
- Area of expertise
- Duration of availability (e.g. 4 weeks)
- Dates of availability (e.g. 15 Aug – 10 October)
Staff to be deployed to Guinea should ideally have French-language skills. In line with the usual GOARN procedures, WHO will cover the cost of travel and per diems (daily allowance) for staff deployed, but will not provide any remuneration (salary) for deployees. However, given the extraordinary scale of the response, and the protracted timeframe for operations, in exceptional circumstances WHO will consider providing financial support to partner institutions to facilitate the deployment of experts, and contribute to the institutional costs of the deployment.
In addition, the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care asks that they be informed when an application to participate has been submitted via emergencymanagement.moh@ontario.ca
WHO and the GOARN Operational Support Team (OST) would like to express gratitude and thank all the GOARN partners that have provided support since the start of this outbreak.