JOHANNESBURG – A member of parliament from Ebola-hit Sierra Leone attending the Pan-African Parliament (PAP) in South Africa on Tuesday called on African states to render additional assistance to Ebola-hit nations and to lift travel bans.
Bernadette Lahai expressed her disappointment in the Pan-African Parliament over the fact that there was no scheduled debate on Ebola, apart from a World Health Organization (WHO) briefing on the disease, during the current sitting.
She informed fellow parliamentarians she would in due course table an urgent motion, which MPs should debate and subsequently come up with resolutions aimed at assisting affected nations.
The outbreak has so far been confirmed in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Guinea, Spain, United States of America and Senegal. The first outbreak was recorded in 1976 in the Democratic Republic of Congo. International media reports last week indicated that the total number of cases since the December outbreak stood at 8 033, with over 4 000 deaths.
Speaking to New Era on the sidelines of Tuesday’s sitting, Lahai said: “I will table an urgent motion so that we can debate it and come up with resolutions that MPs can take to their countries and continental bodies so that we can work together as Africans and put this horrible thing behind us. We also call on all those airlines that stopped flying to Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia to reinstate the flights.”
Before Sierra Leone declared the Ebola outbreak on May 26, 2014, it would take Lahai and her parliamentary colleagues from Sierra Leone less than a day to travel from Freetown [Sierra Leone] to Johannesburg [South Africa], but this time around it took her three days because of the cancelled flights from Freetown to Accra [Ghana] and other bureaucratic measures instituted on travellers from Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.
“Because of these flight bans it took me three days to get here, I started off in Freetown on Sunday at 17h00 with Air Morocco to Casablanca [Morocco] where we were in transit for 17 hours. We could not leave the airport since we were not allowed to stay in their hotels regardless of whether we travelled business class or not. From there we flew to Accra, spent about three hours in transit and eventually last night we flew to Johannesburg where we arrived earlier today [yesterday],” lamented a visibly fatigued Lahai while narrating her trip to this newspaper.
She was disappointed that African states were the first to ban their airlines from flying into affected states, a move which she said created a negative stereotype across the globe.
“When the epidemic started Africans were the first to cancel flights into their regions and this sent a very bad message to the rest of the world, but they eventually caught up with their mistake and some have since rectified it. By placing travelling bans you are killing the people in the affected states and this also does not support the One Africa One People concept,” she said.
Lahai said the situation back home remains critical and serious and that the leaders of Sierra Leone must start thinking of the socio-cultural impact of the disease.
“We are lucky that we can meet as the Pan-African Parliament so we must make use of this platform to debate and discuss the Ebola issue. Other regional bodies such as ECOWAS dissolved their parliaments because of this horrible disease. Some of us want our voices to be heard because we live in affected countries, are close to being infected, lost loved ones and we know the impact of this disease. We therefore want to share our grief and experiences,” she said.
“We want them [African states] to add their voice and to step up all assistance and to reinstate all flights to these affected countries. Our African brothers must also help us ensure that we have more resources such as ambulances, doctors and medical equipment as well as help us feed the infected in the holding centres who need highly nutritious food. We are in need of rapid assistance,” she stated.
She called on experts who have worked on the disease during past outbreaks to train people in Sierra Leone and other affected nations so that they can strengthen their health systems.
“We were told that Ebola does not only come once, therefore we need training but God forbid if it comes again, but we will be stronger and have knowledge on how to deal with it,” she said.
Health workers
at risk
With over 200 health workers having lost their lives since the latest Ebola outbreak last December, health care settings have been identified as the second most common place where Ebola transmission occurs, says the World Health Organization. Since the outbreak of the deadly virus in Guinea last December, health workers treating infected patients are said to be the most exposed to contracting the virus for which no known cure has been found thus far. Since the outbreak about 417 cases of infected health workers were confirmed of which 242 were fatal.
WHO representative in South Africa Sarah Barber briefed African lawmakers attending the Fifth Ordinary Session of the Third Pan-African Parliament on the epidemic.
Before the December outbreak the disease was never seen in West Africa and as a result, Barber says, health workers were unfamiliar with the disease and lacked experience and knowledge on it, adding that there are “myths and misconceptions that the disease was introduced in West Africa by outsiders”.
The WHO representative also singled out the lack of supporting health equipment such as gloves, masks and hospital beds as other factors making it difficult for health workers to effectively treat patients
Weak infection control practices such as water, soap and sterilization are also factors causing the spread of the disease, said Barber.
“The affected countries experienced civil unrest and weak public health systems before the epidemic started.”
Barber is also worried that although there are plans to build more facilities to deal with the virus, there is a critical shortage of clinical teams available to manage them.
In some of the affected countries for every 10 000 people there are only 3-5 health workers.
Given the virulence of the virus, Barber warned there is a possibility of the disease further spreading, because of the weak health systems in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. Barber reiterated the WHO’s recommendations that countries should not institute travel bans.
“The risk of Ebola transmission during travel is low. Sites of transmission are currently limited to affected countries, namely, Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. These bans should only be placed on people infected with the virus,” she said.
She said efforts to stop and reverse the spread of the virus can only be achieved through a coordinated international response and that the best way to prevent the further international spread is to contribute to stopping the outbreak at its source which is Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.