The head of Africa’s leading healthcare body hailed homegrown efforts to tackle the fast-spreading Ebola outbreak, which comes in the wake of Western aid cuts on the continent.
At least 247 people have died in the outbreak, and while it is so far concentrated in central Africa, Brazil is monitoring two patients with symptoms. Health systems in Africa are stretched, Jean Kaseya, the director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, wrote in the Financial Times, but African leadership is driving the response: “Africa’s health security must be built first on African soil.”
The outbreak is straining hard-hit communities in DR Congo: Border closures are hampering local commerce, compounding fuel price hikes caused by the Middle East war in a region already wracked by armed conflict. And fears of a broader economic impact are mounting; the World Bank estimated $2.2 billion in lost GDP from the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Healthcare workers are racing to develop a vaccine to fight the current strain, but experts warn it could take up to nine months.