Ebola response teams remain without resources in DR Congo
By the AFREEQUE newsroom, based on Actualité.cd
Six months after the start of the Ebola outbreak in DR Congo, MSF reports unpaid workers, vehicles immobilised for lack of fuel and community workers without means of communication. The organisation also warns of shortcomings in epidemiological surveillance, according to its six-month assessment.
Health workers involved in the Ebola response in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are still not being paid, some remain inadequately trained and others have sometimes gone on strike, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said in an assessment published six months after the outbreak began. The organisation also reported ambulances and vehicles immobilised for lack of fuel, as well as community workers without phones or an Internet connection to transmit alerts.
MSF identified shortcomings in epidemiological surveillance: only 9% of Ebola patients treated by its teams in Ituri had previously been identified as contacts by the surveillance system. Over the past month, nearly two-thirds of reported Ebola-related deaths occurred in communities rather than treatment centres.
In the Beni health zone, in North Kivu, nearly three-quarters of Ebola patients are believed to have contracted the disease in a medical facility, according to MSF. The organisation cited insufficient sterilisation capacity, access to water and chlorine, as well as triage in some facilities.
MSF’s assessment comes after its 12 November warning that Ebola remains out of control in DR Congo. The organisation also said the same day that 700 million dollars remain untraceable in the fight against Ebola.
