Sierra Leone

The Ministry of Health and Sanitation will soon embark on a mass drug administration to reduce Lymphatic Filariasis in the country.
During a media brief at the conference room of the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, the Programme Manager for Neglected Tropical Diseases in Sierra Leone, Dr Yakuba Bah called on members of the public to improve in sanitation in their various communities.

  A company with a swarm of genetically modified mosquitoes wants   the Food and Drug Administrationto grant emergency approval for   the controversial insects' use in the fight against the Zika virus.

 Oxitec changed the DNA of the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes that    spread the virus so their offspring die before adulthood, Hadyn  Parry, the British company's CEO, told the House of    Representatives' Committee on Science, Space, and Technology in Washington on Wednesday. The company deploys only male mosquitoes, which cannot bite, to halt transmission of the disease, he added.

"I don’t think time is on our side with Zika," Parry said.

As Government and TRANSCO- CLSG dialogue with Kenema District on regional energy, members of the Kenema District monitoring committee on Wednesday elected Alice Koroma as the Chair for the District Monitoring Committee.

Alice Koroma is the Regional Director, East for the Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children’s Affairs and a member of the district monitoring committee that will monitor project activities as contractors by TRANSCO-CLSG carry out technical and infrastructure work.

During the two-day local committee meeting, representatives from the various sectors in the Kenema district administration, including representatives from the chiefdoms to be affected during the West African Power Pool (WAPP) energy project to be implemented by TRANSCO- CLSG converged at Paloma conference room in Kenema.

The Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children’s Affairs (MSWGCA) with support from Decentralization Services Delivery Project (DSDP) support to Kenema District Council has ended a-two day training of social workers and other partners in the sixteen chiefdoms of Kenema district on the Anti- Human Trafficking Act 2005.

A facilitator who is also the Senior Social Services Officer Trafficking in Persons-Eastern Region, Vandy Bawoh said the training was meant to upgrade the social service workers to be able to distinguish trafficking cases from other protection matters. He said that at the end of the training, participants would be able to identify victims in their respective chiefdoms and to make appropriate referrals.
He called on participants to take the training with the seriousness it deserves and to put into practice whatever knowledge they acquire from the training.