AFRICA CENTER FOR STRATEGIC STUDIES, Washington D.C.                        Nov. 12, 2014

Summary of lessons learned from Nigeria and Uganda in containing outbreaks of Ebola

“If a country like Nigeria, hampered by serious security problems, can do this – that is, make significant progress towards interrupting polio transmission, eradicate guinea-worm disease and contain Ebola, all at the same time,” said WHO Director-General Margaret Chan, “any country in the world experiencing an imported case can hold onward transmission to just a handful of cases....”

"Numerous African states have identified and refined the best ways of containing the disease."

Read complete report

http://africacenter.org/2014/11/no-time-for-a-learning-curve-nigerias-crucial-success-against-ebola/?utm_source=November+14++2014+EN&utm_campaign=11%2F14%2F2014&utm_medium=email

UPDATE:   Additonal information on the WHO discussions of potential Ebola treatments.

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REUTERS                                                      Nov. 14, 2014

By Tom Miles

GENEVA --The World Health Organization (WHO) has begun assessing more than 120 potential treatments for Ebola patients, it said on Friday, but so far has found none that definitely work, and some that definitely do not....

The apparent effect of ZMapp or other drugs that have been tried may simply be a result of the good care that the patients had received, or the fact that they were well-nourished before they fell sick, or because of other medicines, Friede said.

Medecins Sans Frontieres plans to start trials next month of the drugs brincidofovir, from the U.S. firm Chimerix, and favipiravir, from Japan's Fujifilm, and to see how well blood plasma from Ebola survivors may work in curing those still infected....

Read complete story

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/14/us-health-ebola-who-treatments-idUSKCN0IY1CR20141114

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Additional Information:

NPR                                                          Nov. 14, 2014

By Jason Beaubien

"This is not just one case," says Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "It's a cluster." He's talking about the Ebola situation in Mali, where two people have likely died of the disease in Bamako, the capital, and two others have tested positive.

Hundreds more may have been exposed. Officials from the U.N., the World Health Organization, the government of Mali and the CDC are all calling for swift action to keep Mali from descending into the Ebola chaos that has  hit neighboring Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

"This is very deeply concerning," says Frieden. The CDC is sending additional staff to help respond to the outbreak.

This cluster of new cases centers around a private hospital in Bamako. On Oct. 27, an imam from Guinea died at the clinic from what had been diagnosed as kidney failure.

This week a nurse who treated him died of Ebola. Two other people from the clinic — one of them a doctor — have tested positive for the virus. The body of the imam was sent to a mosque for ritual cleansing, then returned to Guinea for a large public funeral before authorities in Mali realized he probably died of Ebola.

Frieden says the risk of this cluster turning into a major outbreak is high.

foreignaffairs.house.gov - November 13, 2014 - 10:00am to 1:00pm
2172 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, DC 20515

(CLICK HERE FOR RECORDED VIDEO OF THE HEARING AND LINKS TO FULL STATEMENTS)

Chairman Royce on the hearing: “The Ebola epidemic that has besieged Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone for the past seven months is unprecedented in scale, with devastating consequences for the region. This hearing will examine ongoing international and U.S. efforts to contain this epidemic at its source in West Africa and the Administration’s emergency request for funding. We will hear from the head of the lead agency on the ground, Administrator Rajiv Shah, and from representatives of the defense community, who are playing an integral role in the response. We will also seek information about what other donors are – and are not – doing to address this dire health emergency.”

WITNESSES:

The Honorable Rajiv Shah
Administrator
U.S. Agency for International Development

The Honorable Bisa Williams
Deputy Assistant Secretary
Bureau of African Affairs
U.S. Department of State

People walk past a billboard with a message about Ebola in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, on November 7. Public awareness campaigns are proving vital in the fight against the virus.

Description of African efforts to improve communications to counter the spread of Ebola

CCN                                                                                                                                Nov. 17, 2014

By Alex Court (CNN)-- "When the Ebola outbreak started, it was very terrifying for everybody," recalls Michael Chu'no Ike from Nsukka in Nigeria's Enugu State. "People were afraid it could be transmitted by air and started believing all sorts of rumors about how to boost their immunity."

NEW YORK TIMES OP-ED                                                                                                          Nov. 13, 2014

By Chernor Bah,  a former refugee from the civil war in Sierra Leone, is a youth advocate for the Global Partnership for Education and a co-founder of A World at School.

Arriving at Port Loko, one of the largest towns in the north of Sierra Leone, is like reaching a country under siege. In the face of Ebola, the 500,000 inhabitants of this district have been sealed off from the world, stigmatized like a cellblock of criminals, and left largely to fend for themselves. Even to bring them food and schoolbooks, you need a government pass. And they are not alone. Counting other districts under quarantine, more than a third of the nation cannot move freely.

USA TODAY                                                 Nov.13, 2014
By Michael Winter

A third Ebola patient is headed to the Nebraska Medical Center this weekend, according to news reports Thursday.

CBS News said the patient was a surgeon infected with the virus while treating victims in Sierra Leone, one of the hardest-hit areas of West Africa.

NBC News said the patient is a Sierra Leonean national who is a permanent resident of the United States...

The Biocontainment Unit at the University of Nebraska facility in Omaha has already successfully treated and released two others -- Dr. Rick Sacra, a missionary delivering babies in Liberia, and Ashoka Mukpo, an NBC News freelance cameraman who also became infected while working in Liberia.
Read complete story

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/11/13/ebola-nebraska-third-patient/18995987/

THE DAILY BEAST                                                                                                           Nov. 11, 2014
By Carfrie Arnold

These nocturnal fliers might do some good, but their association with night, rabies, and All Things Creepy means that, at best, we tolerate them. Adding to their negative aura is recent research showing that bats can be the source of infectious diseases like SARS and Ebola, as well as lesser-known pathogens like Hendra and Nipah virus.

It’s all too easy to blame bats for causing these human pandemics, including the most recent (and deadliest) Ebola outbreak. After all, these viruses hang out in bats in between outbreaks—trace any outbreak of these viruses back far enough and you will find a bat.

NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE                                                                  Nov. 12, 2014

Eric J. Rubin, M.D., Ph.D., and Lindsey R. Baden, M.D.

The Journal has now published detailed clinical information about three patients transferred from West Africa to the United States or Germany in the midst of their illness.

See details of the treatment

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe1412744

ASSOCIATED PRESS                                         Nov. 13, 2014

By Jonathan Paye-Leyleh and Baba Ahmed

MONROVIA, Liberia (AP) — Liberia's president said Thursday she is lifting a state of emergency imposed to control an Ebola outbreak that has ravaged the country, as Mali raced to track down everyone who may have come into contact with three people now believed to have died of Ebola in its capital.

Also Thursday, Doctors Without Borders announced that accelerated clinical trials will be launched in West Africa to speed the search for a treatment for the virus that has killed more than 5,000 people.

In a nationwide address, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said enough progress has been made to lift emergency measures but added that the move does not mean the outbreak is over. There have been fewer Ebola cases in Monrovia, the capital, though fresh hotspots have emerged. One of those is near the border with Sierra Leone, which along with Guinea has also been hit hard by the disease.

Read complete story.

http://news.yahoo.com/medical-aid-group-host-3-ebola-clinical-trials-090631858.html

HOMELAND SECURITY NEWS WIRE                                                                                             Nov. 13, 2014
By Catherine de Fontenay
Economists are being called upon to estimate the costs of the Ebola epidemic to West Africa and elsewhere. Economists, however, should also play a part in estimating the likelihood of the disease spreading. Economics is the study of incentives, and many biological models of the spread of the disease may be underestimating the impact of individual incentives.

 Based on cost-benefit analysis, the potential costs of Ebola spreading are extremely high and the risks may be much higher than they are currently portrayed. Voters and donors should support greater efforts to end Ebola in West Africa. As International Monetary Fund director Christine Lagarde says, “real action” is needed to counter the outbreak. Without such action Ebola places the global economy at risk.

...If Ebola spreads throughout West Africa, the cost could rise to US$32.6 billion by the end of 2015.
Read complete article
http://www.homelandsecuritynewswire.com/dr20141113-the-economics-of-ebola

BBC NEWS MAGAZINE                                            NOV. 11, 2014

By Ben Carter

The Ebola virus has killed about 5,000 people since March - but one scientist who is studying the statistics says this is not the best figure to consider if we really want to understand the current state of the outbreak and how to beat it.

A total of 4,960 people have died from Ebola this year according to statistics released by the World Health Organisation on 4 November. More than half of those cases - 2,766 - were in Liberia.

But this cumulative figure, which is widely reported, can only go one way - up. It gives no meaningful insight into how the outbreak has developed says Hans Rosling, professor of global health at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden....

Read full story.
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30011521

NEW YORK TIMES                                                         Nov. 13, 2014

By HELENE COOPER and SABRINA TAVERNISE

WASHINGTON — As the rate of new Ebola infections in Liberia has slowed, American and Liberian officials are debating whether to build all 17 planned Ebola treatment centers in the country or to shift money from the Obama administration that was planned for the centers into other programs to combat future outbreaks.

appropriations.senate.gov - C-SPAN3 - November 12, 2014

Full Committee Hearing on the U.S. Government Response to the Ebola outbreak
 
WHEN:             WEDNESDAY, November 12, 2014 at 2:00 p.m.
                                                                                                             
WHERE:            Room SD-G50 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building

(VIEW THE RECORDED VIDEO IN THE LINKS BELOW)

http://www.appropriations.senate.gov/webcast/full-committee-hearing-us-government-response-fighting-ebola-and-protecting-america

DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS                                                                              Nov. 12, 2014

The international medical organisation Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) or Doctors Without Borders has posted an online briefing on Ebola for aid workers involved in the battle against the haemorrhagic fever. This briefing package is now available to anyone wishing to gain a basic understanding of the virus and how it can be contained.

http://www.msf.org/article/ebola-online-briefing-now-available-public