Saturday 13 September 2014

Ebola disease and the international response.

Ebola and the international response.
History revealed that the first recorded case of Ebola outbreak was in Congo DR in 1976 and since that time there had been recorded cases in other parts of Africa like Sudan, Uganda, Gabon devastating families and communities. However those outbreaks have always been limited to isolated villages and communities and never spreading to major cities and towns with a larger populace. This majorly l believe  has been contributory to the poor response that this very deadly and devastating disease has been getting from the committee of nations especially the western nations with their more advanced technology and expertise. These present outbreaks however reveals how all nations of the world is at risk of getting this disease imported into their country.
The world is a global village and with movement across countries that are very far apart now possible within hours the possibility of getting it across to other part of the world is very high. We have seen the Nigeria case where an American Liberian  national Patrick Sawyerr carried it form Liberia to Nigeria.
Other volunteer workers from other countries are now coming down this time around which is usually not the case before. We have noticed 3 Americans working in Liberia coming down with the disease with 2 successfully treated so far while a Briton serving in Sierra leone too also recovering from  the disease.
Now the world especially the western world are now seriously looking at the disease and how to conquer it. However, it takes for them to see how it can affect them before it was taken seriously by them.
This is sad considering how many lives had been lost and still loosing to this terrible disease before every body is now waking up to its reality. Interest was not shown because the research companies does not see how it can be profitable to them after all it usually comes in an outbreak and disappears, affects poor communities with no possibility of it reaching cities with larger populace or even their countries.
Now all research companies are now into it seriously now that the world is talking about it and the possibility of profit is now high.
It really, really is unfortunate and a sad testimony to how the world works and things are done only when  there is going to be something to be gained and not necessarily for humanity.
It is my hope that humanity will not find itself in situations like these again. The ebola disease is one of the greatest pestilences that the world has ever witness but the good news is that people are still able to survive ti.
In the outbreak in DR Congo  in 1995 some group of the Congolese doctors decided to use the blood from a survivor to treat a nurse involved in caring for those infected and who also got sick from it and they decided to give her the blood from the survival of the disease hoping that the immunity developed by him will help the nurse and she was able to recover and 7 out of 8 treated that way survived.
The international volunteers resisted the treatment being carried out on her and the  others  but they still went ahead.
Even Dr Brantley was given such treatment before he was transferred to the US. It is sad that such treatment that has worked all this while was ignored for such along time and it is sad because the idea did not come from international community it was not accepted it was rejected as not being ethically correct.
However, things will not always remains the same forever as change is the only constant thing in life and of course it is part of evolving.
This is what the WHO has done and has approved this method as a means of treating those affected. For those who took a  long time to evolve and those who did not it is the end result that matters because everybody has faced and accepted the challenges and the reality of this terrible disease and are now evolving – for better. Do you think the west was slow in responding? what else could have been done to control these disease? Your views will be highly appreciated,

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